Pianist Adam Golka makes Carnegie Hall Debut 3/7

On Sunday, March 7 at 2:00pm pianist Adam Golka will make his Carnegie Hall debut with the New York Youth Symphony conducted by Ryan McAdams in Rachmanioff's Concerto No .3

Also on the program is The Rite of Spring by Stravinsky and the world première of Timothy Stulman's Element Cycle for orchestra commissioned as the 77th orchestral work of the First Music series. All tickets are $15.

PROGRAM

Composed for ballet, Stravinsky's Rite of Spring, was a departure from the more conservative standard of the time. Its taut dramatic pacing and rhythmic invention makes the piece just as shocking and thrilling as the day it was premiered nearly a hundred years ago. Timothy Stulman's Element Cycle is a narrative of the five Chinese elements earth, metal, water, wood and fire. Each movement is a representation of a single inherent quality of a specific element starting with the barren earth and ending with death through destructive fire. Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 3 has a ferocious form of romanticism that has captivated worldwide audiences for decades. One of the most challenging piano concertos written, it requires a player of substantial technique and formidable intellect to create a sustainable path through the work.

ABOUT THE ARTIST

22-year-old pianist Adam Golka is the winner of two of America's most prestigious musical awards: the 2008 Gilmore Young Artist Award, and most recently the 2009 Max I. Allen Classical Fellowship Award of the American Pianists Association.

Golka has performed nearly 300 concerts since he took the first prize in the Shanghai International Piano Competition at age 16 in 2003. His extensive concerto appearances have included the Atlanta, Houston, Dallas, Milwaukee, Indianapolis, and Fort Worth symphonies, as well as the BBC Scottish Symphony, National Arts Centre Orchestra (Ottawa), the Shanghai Philharmonic. He has also collaborated with such eminent conductors as Donald Runnicles and Miguel Harth-Bedoya, who have regularly re-engaged Mr. Golka in past seasons, as well as Pinchas Zukerman, Michael Christie, Andreas Delfs, Daniel Hege, Julian Kuerti, Michael Morgan, and his brother, conductor Tomasz Golka.

Golka's solo and chamber music appearances have taken him to famous venues such as the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Carnegie Hall (Weill RecitAl Hall) in New York, Musashino Hall in Tokyo, Nakanoshima Hall in Osaka, the Kravis Center in West Palm Beach, and prestigious festivals such as the Gilmore Keyboard Festival, the Ravinia Festival, Music@Menlo, the New York City International Keyboard Festival at Mannes, the Newport Music Festival, and the Duszniki Chopin festival. In 2006, Adam gave his first performance of the cycle of the complete Beethoven piano sonata cycle; he continues to devote much time to working on these sonatas and plans to renew his interpretations of the cycle throughout his career.

Highlights of Golka's 2009-2010 season include concertos of Chopin, Liszt, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff, and Ravel with the Warsaw Philharmonic and the Indianapolis, Knoxville, West Virginia, Wichita, Silicon Valley, and Pensacola Symphonies, as well as the River Oaks Chamber Orchestra. Throughout the 09-10 season, Adam will also be premiering esteemed American composer Richard Danielpour's "Piano Fantasy" (2008), commissioned for him by the Gilmore International Keyboard Festival.

A 1st generation American, Golka owes his unique background to his parents, Polish musicians who fled Communist-controlled Poland in the 1980's in search of a better life. Born and raised in Houston, Texas, Golka moved to Fort Worth, when he was 15 years-old, in order to pursue studies with his teacher and mentor, Jose Feghali. Currently, Adam resides in Baltimore, Maryland, where he is studying with the legendary Leon Fleisher at the Peabody Institute. Adam previously worked with Maestro Fleisher at a special workshop devoted to Beethoven's Sonatas at Carnegie Hall, and at the Steans Institute for Young Artists at Ravinia, which he participated in for two summers.

NEW YORK YOUTH SYMPHONY

This year, the award-winning New York Youth Symphony celebrates its 47th consecutive season in Carnegie Hall and its 26th season of First Music, the organization's nationally acclaimed commissioning program for young American composers.

Since its inception in 1984, First Music has commissioned 102 composers to write world premieres for orchestra, chamber music, and big band jazz. It has been recognized with numerous awards and has helped advance the careers of young composers, who have won since their commissions 15 Guggenheim Fellowships, 12 Rome Prizes, and two Pulitzer Prizes.

The New York Youth Symphony's tuition-free programs began in 1963 as an orchestra of talented players, ages 12-22, and have since expanded to reach students through offerings of chamber music, apprentice conducting, composition, and jazz band. More than 210 students are enrolled for the 2009-10 season, their participation enabled by a scholarship program of over $1 million.

In addition to the 100-member orchestra, the Chamber Music Program provides 28 ensembles with coaching from, among many others, members of the Tokyo, Shanghai, and Orion String Quartets and the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. Jazz Band Classic hosts soloists and clinics with major artists such as Joe Lovano, Benny Powell, and Warren Vaché, and gives sold-out performances in Symphony Space and Jazz at Lincoln Center. The ground-breaking Making Score sessions for young composers features guest lecturers such as John Corigliano, Philip Glass, John Harbison, Midori, Steve Reich, and Stephen Sondheim.

RYAN MCADAMS, conductor

Twenty-seven year old conductor Ryan McAdams is the 15th Music Director of the New York Youth Symphony. A Fulbright scholar, he previously served as Apprentice Conductor of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic under the tutelage of then-Chief Conductor (now Music Director-Designate of the New York Philharmonic) Alan Gilbert. In 2007, he was invited by Lorin Maazel to create the post of Apprentice Conductor for the Chateauville Foundation at the Maazel Estate in Virginia, assisting Maestro Maazel on a production of Britten's "The Rape of Lucretia" with singers from the MET Lindermann program.

This past summer, at the invitation of James Levine and the Tanglewood Festival, he served as one of Tanglewood's Conducting Fellows. Highlights included a performance of Stravinsky's Concerto for Piano and Wind Instruments with Peter Serkin, assisting Maestro Levine on a performance of Act III of Wagner's "Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg," and a performance of John Zorn's violin concerto "Contes de Fees" which will be commercially released by the composer.

Highlights of the 2009-2010 season include appearances with the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, New York City Opera, Princeton Symphony, Tanglewood Music Festival, and Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, in addition to his three Carnegie Hall performances with the NYYS. He also served as cover conductor to David Robertson and the Saint Louis Symphony at Carnegie Hall in performances of the U.S. Premiere of John Adams' "Doctor Atomic Symphony" and Messiaen's "Turangalila" Symphony, and as assistant conductor to Anne Manson at the Juilliard Opera Center for the New York premiere of Ned Rorem's "Our Town."

For more information, please visit http://www.ryan-mcadams.com/

TICKET INFORMATION: Concert tickets are $15. Tickets are available online at www.nyys.org, by phone at 212-581-5933, or by visiting the Carnegie Hall box office.