Alan Gilbert News

A live concert recording of the New York Philharmonic's performance of Mahler's Symphony No. 1 conducted by Alan Gilbert will be available for streaming on the Orchestra's Website, nyphil.org, through July 31, 2009.

Having taken a bus, a plane, and another bus, the New York Philharmonic has arrived in Colorado and begun rehearsals for its seventh annual residency in Vail. The first concert is tonight, conducted by Music Director Designate Alan Gilbert and with baritone Nathan Gunn singing Copland.

A live concert recording of the New York Philharmonic's performance of Mahler's Symphony No. 1 conducted by Alan Gilbert will be available for streaming on the Orchestra's Website, nyphil.org, through July 31, 2009.

The New York Philharmonic will open its doors to the public on Wednesday, September 16, 2009, at 9:45 a.m. for a free Open Rehearsal for the evening's concert, which will launch the Orchestra's 168th season, Alan Gilbert's inaugural season as the Philharmonic's 25th Music Director.

On July 16 and 17, 2009, the New York Philharmonic Concerts in the Parks, presented by Didi and Oscar Schafer, sponsored by Target and MetLife Foundation, brought the Orchestra to the Bronx and back to Manhattan. Alan Gilbert, who will become the Orchestra?s Music Director in September 2009, conducted and was joined by baritone Nathan Gunn in Central Park. An online photo album captures the excitement.

American baritone Thomas Hampson has been named the Leonard Bernstein Scholar-in-Residence at the New York Philharmonic for the 2009-10 season in conjunction with his role as The Mary and James G. Wallach Artist-in-Residence. Mr. Hampson will present two Insight Series events and the Annual Erich Leinsdorf Lecture in a series entitled 'Listening to Thought,' exploring the interplay of verbal and musical languages in vocal music.

On July 14, 2009, the New York Philharmonic opened the 2009 Concerts in the Parks, Presented by Didi and Oscar Schafer, Sponsored by Target and MetLife Foundation, with works by Mozart and Beethoven performed on the Great Lawn of Central Park before an estimated crowd of 80,000. Music Director Designate Alan Gilbert was at the helm.

This summer, for the first time, those attending the free 2009 New York Philharmonic Concerts in the Parks, Presented by Didi and Oscar Schafer, Sponsored by Target and MetLife Foundation, can send a text message to support the Philharmonic and its free concerts in the parks.

The New York Philharmonic's performance of Mahler's Symphony No. 8, Symphony of a Thousand, conducted by Lorin Maazel in his last program with the Orchestra as Music Director, will be broadcast live, Thursday, June 25, 2009, on The New York Philharmonic This Week - a two-hour, national, weekly radio program of concerts by the Philharmonic.

Gary W. Parr was elected Chairman of the Board of Directors of The Philharmonic-Symphony Society of New York, Inc., today at a meeting of the organization's Board of Directors. He will hold the title of Chairman Designate through the summer and assume the Chairmanship on September 24, 2009, succeeding Paul B. Guenther, who has held the post since September 1996. As Chairman, Mr. Parr will serve as the Society's chief volunteer officer.

The world premiere by New York Philharmonic Composer-in-Residence Magnus Lindberg that will open the 2009-10 season - Alan Gilbert's debut season as Music Director - has been titled EXPO. The work, commissioned by the New York Philharmonic, will be the first piece on the Philharmonic's opening night program, conducted by Mr. Gilbert on September 16, 2009. 'I wanted to give it a strong, celebratory title,' explains Mr. Lindberg. The work will be the first of two World Premiere-New York Philharmonic Commissions by Mr. Lindberg to be performed in the 2009-10 season.

New York Philharmonic Principal Clarinet Stanley Drucker, who will retire from the Orchestra at the end of the 2008-09 season concluding a 60-year tenure, has set a new Guinness World Record for the 'Longest Career as a Clarinetist.' The record text reads: 'The longest career as a clarinetist was achieved by Stanley Drucker (USA, b. 4 February 1929) who performed professionally for 62 years, 7 months, 1 day as of June 4, 2009.'

At a press conference in Tokyo today, New York Philharmonic Music Director Designate Alan Gilbert and President and Executive Director Zarin Mehta announced the details of Asian Horizons: Alan Gilbert and the New York Philharmonic, October 8?24, 2009. This will be the Orchestra?s inaugural international concert tour under the leadership of Alan Gilbert, who will begin his tenure as Music Director in September 2009. Asian Horizons will consist of eleven concerts, spanning five Asian countries, with performances in Tokyo, Japan (a destination of special significance in light of Mr. Gilbert?s Japanese heritage); Seoul, Korea; Singapore; and the Philharmonic?s debut performances in Hanoi, Vietnam, and Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. Pianist Emanuel Ax and violinists Frank Peter Zimmermann and Ye-Eun Choi (Philharmonic debut) are the featured soloists on the tour. Asian Horizons marks the fourth New York Philharmonic concert tour under the aegis of Credit Suisse, the Orchestra?s Global Sponsor, and the second in Asia.

The New York Philharmonic's performance of Mahler's Symphony No. 8, Symphony of a Thousand, conducted by Lorin Maazel in his last program with the Orchestra as Music Director, will be broadcast live, Thursday, June 25, 2009, on The New York Philharmonic This Week - a two-hour, national, weekly radio program of concerts by the Philharmonic.

Today, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts officially launches a yearlong celebration of its 50th Anniversary with a commemorative ceremony in the Starr Theater at Alice Tully Hall. Hosted by renowned journalist and author Tom Brokaw, the program pays tribute to the many achievements and contributions of Lincoln Center, from the milestones of its past half century to the transformation of its campus.

On the morning of May 11, 2009, 50 years after that momentous occasion, Lincoln Center will begin a year-long celebration of its 50th anniversary with a special ceremony in the newly-transformed Alice Tully Hall. New York Philharmonic Music Director Alan Gilbert, acclaimed violinist Itzhak Perlman with alumni from The Perlman Music Program, Tony Award-winning opera star Paulo Szot, jazz icon Wynton Marsalis with members of the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, and The Juilliard Orchestra are among those scheduled to perform in a program that celebrates the past 50 years and looks to the next generation of Lincoln Center's artists and audiences. In the audience of this private event will be elected officials, performing artists, civic and community representatives, and leaders from all 12 Lincoln Center resident organizations.

In June 2009, The New York Philharmonic This Week ? a two-hour, national, weekly radio program of concerts by the New York Philharmonic ? begins with a concert from the Philharmonic?s sixth annual residency in Vail, Colorado, as part of the Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival. In this program, from the July 18, 2008 performance, Music Director Designate Alan Gilbert leads the Orchestra in Tchaikovsky?s Piano Concerto No. 1, with Lang Lang as soloist; Beethoven?s Symphony No. 4; and Sibelius?s Finlandia. The following week, after conducting J.S. Bach?s Brandenburg Concerto No. 4, Music Director Lorin Maazel leads the World Premiere of Aaron Jay Kernis?s a Voice, a Messenger (a Co-Commission with the New York Philharmonic and the Big Ten Band Association); Copland?s Clarinet Concerto, with Principal Clarinet Stanley Drucker as soloist; and Ravel?s Boléro. The third June broadcast, conducted by Lorin Maazel, will be Britten?s powerful War Requiem. Lionel Bringuier conducts the chamber orchestra (in his Philharmonic debut), and soprano Nancy Gustafson, tenor Vale Rideout (Philharmonic debut), and baritone Ian Greenlaw will be the soloists with the New York Choral Artists, the Dessoff Symphonic Choir, and the Brooklyn Youth Chorus. In the final June broadcast, Lorin Maazel conducts two of his own compositions, Monaco Fanfares and Farewells, concluding with Sibelius?s Symphony No. 2.

Alan Gilbert, who will become Music Director of the New York Philharmonic in September 2009, returns to New York to lead two weeks of programs with the Orchestra. The first series of concerts ? Thursday, April 30, 2009, at 7:30 p.m., Friday and Saturday, May 1 and 2, and 8:00 p.m., and Tuesday, May 5, at 7:30 p.m. will comprise Dvorák?s The Golden Spinning Wheel; Saint-Saëns?s Violin Concerto No. 3, with Joshua Bell as soloist; and Martin's Symphony No. 4.

Chicago Opera Theater opens their 2009 Spring Festival Season on April 18 with Mozart's La clemenza di Tito (through May 1) at the Harris Theater for Music and Dance in Millennium Park. Absent from Chicago stages in more than a generation, La clemenza di Tito has made a resurgence in the rest of the world. Most notably in New York City last year?both at the Metropolitan Opera and at the Lincoln Center's Mostly Mozart Festival. The New York Times declared, 'Clemenza emerges as a musically ravishing and dramatically complex opera of great immediacy.'

New York Philharmonic Music Director Designate Alan Gilbert will lead the New York Philharmonic in five free concerts this summer throughout the City of New York, from July 14 to 20. He will conduct all of the 2009 New York Philharmonic Concerts in the Parks, Presented by Didi and Oscar Schafer, sponsored by Target, which will take place July 14?17, 2009 in Manhattan, Brooklyn and the Bronx, as well as two free indoor concerts, in Staten Island and Queens, on July 18 and July 20 respectively.