Philharmonic to offer a feast of new music and guest artists in 2014-15
Lisa Batiashvili will perform the Brahms and Barber violin concertos next season with the New York Philharmonic.
The New York Philharmonic announced its 2014-15 season, their sixth under music director Alan Gilbert, Wednesday.
Continuing their new and successful tradition of mounting partially staged dramatic works at Avery Fisher Hall, the highlights include Honegger’s Joan of Arc at the Stake (June 10-13, 2015), featuring actor Marion Cotillard and players from the Comédie-Française, and the world premiere of a one-act opera from Peter Eötvös, Senza Sangue (May 8-9, 2015). The season opens with a gala concert September 16, with violinist Joshua Bell, soprano Renée Fleming and singer Josh Groban: “La Dolce Vita, The Music of Italian Cinema.”
Featured during the year will be several New York, U.S. and world premieres: the debut performances of John Adams’ Scheherezade.2 (March 26-28, 2015), a co-commission with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam, the Royal Concertgebouw, and the Sydney Symphony, with violinist Leila Josefowicz as soloist; Senza Sangue, explicitly made as a companion to Bartók’s Bluebeard’s Castle and featuring mezzo-soprano Anne Sofie von Otter and baritone Russell Braun; the U.S. premiere of Thierry Escaich’s Concerto for Violin and Oboe (April 8-11, 2015) with 2014-15 Artist-in-Residence Lisa Batiashvili, violinist, and her husband, oboe player François Leleux; the U.S. premiere of Unsuk Chin’s Clarinet Concerto (September 23, 26-27 and 30, 2014), with Kari Kriikku as soloist; and a world premiere from Composer-in-Residence Christopher Rouse, Thunderstuck (October 9-11 and 14, 2014), along with New York premieres of his Flute Concerto, (October 30-31, November 1, 2014, Leonard Slatkin conducting) with Robert Langevin soloing, and Iscariot (February 5-7, 2015), David Zinman leading the orchestra).
Batiashvili will make her first appearance of the season October 9-11 and 14, 2014, soloing in the Brahms’ Violin Concerto, and then playing the Barber Violin Concerto April 8-11, 2015 and giving a recital with Paul Lewis, March 30, 2015.
A new artist in the coming season is the Philharmonic’s first Artist-in-Association, pianist Inon Barnatan. The position, in Gilbert’s words, “presents the opportunity to introduce artists who haven’t appeared [with us] … Someone … we are willing to commit to over a period of time.” Barnoton will play with Philharmonic musicians in the Dvorak Piano Quintet, Op. 81 on February 7, and will debut with the orchestra March 19-20, 2015, in Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G Major.
A “Dohnányi/Dvorak” festival runs from December 4-13, 2015, lead by guest conductor Christoph von Dohnányi, and includes Symphony No. 9, From The New World, the Cello Concerto with soloist Alisa Weilerstein, the Piano Concerto with pianist Martin Helmchen making his Philharmonic debut, and Symphony No. 7, along with work by a contemporary Czech composer, to be announced. Dohnányi is one of several notable guest conductors, four of whom will be making their debuts with the orchestra: Susanna Mälkki (May 21-23, 2015), Juanjo Mena (December 30, 2014, January 2-3 and 6, 2015), Stéphane Denève (Febuary 11-13, 2015) and Thomas Adés (March 12-14, 2015), who will lead the U.S. premiere of his Totentanz with mezzo-soprano Christianne Stotijn and baritone Simon Keenlyside, both also debuting with the Philharmonic.
Pianist Jeremy Denk will also appear for the first time with the orchestra, October 16-18, 2014, in Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 1 under Esa-Pekka Salonen, and soprano Angela Meade debuts in Verdi’s Requiem, January 15-17, 2015. The fifteenth anniversary of Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Project will be celebrated, along with the Chinese New Year, in concerts February 19-21, 2015, with another U.S. premiere from Zhao Lin. The CONTACT! new music series will continue, in programs to be announced, at SubCulture and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The Philharmonic’s Nielsen Project of live recordings will conclude October 1-3, 2014, with the Helios Overture and Symphonies No. 5 and No. 6, Sinfonia Semplice. A four-disc set of the entire Nielsen recordings is set for release on June 9, 2015, the 150th anniversary of the composer’s birth.
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