Barber
Corigliano
Dvořák
Alan Gilbert and the
New York Philharmonic
2011–12 Season
Alan Gilbert and the New York Philharmonic
2011–12 Season
Alan Gilbert and the New York Philharmonic: 2011–12 Season — 12 live
recordings of performances conducted by
the Music Director — reflects the passion
and curiosity that marks the Orchestra
today. Alan Gilbert’s third season with
the New York Philharmonic continues
a voyage of exploration of the new and
unfamiliar while reveling in the greatness of the past, in works that the Music
Director has combined to form telling and
intriguing programs.
Every performance reveals the chemistry
that has developed between Alan Gilbert
and the musicians, whom he has praised
for having “a unique ethic, a spirit of wanting to play at the highest level no matter
what the music is, and that trans­lates into
an ability to treat an incredible variety
of styles brilliantly.” He feels that audiences are aware of this, adding, “I have
noticed that at the end of performances
the ovations are often the loud­est when
the Philharmonic musicians stand for their
bow: this is both an acknowledgment of
the power and beauty with which they perform, and of their dedication and commitment — and their inspiration — throughout
the season.”
These high-quality recordings of almost
30 works, available internationally, reflect
Alan Gilbert’s approach to programming
which combines works as diverse as One
Sweet Morning — a song cycle by American master composer John Corigliano
exploring the nature of war on the tenth
anniversary of the events of 9/11 — with
cornerstones of the repertoire, such as
Dvořák’s lyrical yet brooding Seventh
Symphony. The bonus content includes
audio recordings of Alan Gilbert’s onstage
commentaries, program notes published in
each concert’s Playbill, and encores given
by today’s leading soloists.
For more information about the series,
visit nyphil.org/recordings.
New York Philharmonic
Alan Gilbert, Conductor
Stephanie Blythe, Mezzo-Soprano
Recorded live September 30–October 1 & 4, 2011
Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
BARBER (1910–81)
Essay No. 1 for Orchestra, Op. 12 (1937–38)
John CORIGLIANO (b. 1938)
One Sweet Morning, for Mezzo-Soprano and Orchestra (2011; World Premiere–Co-Commission by the New York Philharmonic, Alan Gilbert, Music Director, and the
Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, Long Yu, Music Director)
A Song on the End of the World
Patroclus —
War South of the Great Wall —
One Sweet Morning
26:37
8:19
6:55
6:12
5:11
STEPHANIE BLYTHE
DVOŘÁK (1841–1904)
Symphony No. 7 in D minor, Op. 70 (1884–85)
Allegro maestoso
Poco adagio
Vivace — Poco meno mosso
Allegro
2
9:05
38:05
11:09
9:57
7:45
9:15
3
Alan Gilbert on This Program
I think John Corigliano is one of the important storytellers in American music, and
I have always loved his work. I’ll never forget his opera Ghosts of Versailles at The
Metropolitan Opera because I had never heard a contemporary composer speak in
such a natural, vernacular voice; while the subject matter was obviously historical, I
felt it to be touching in a directly American way. It seemed particularly appropriate to
have him write a piece that reflected on the 10th anniversary of 9/11. He’s written
a marvelous work. It touches on many important aspects of humanity, particularly on
the finding of hope in the midst of tragedy.
The Corigliano is framed by a masterfully terse statement by one of America’s great
composers, Samuel Barber, and by what may be Dvořák’s greatest symphony. Dvořák’s
last four symphonies — Six, Seven, Eight, and Nine — represent his true greatness as a
symphonist. Of these the Seventh is the darkest, the most intense, the most brooding.
Dvořák is one of the great melodists, with tunes that are singable and unforgettable, and
you find those here as well, but what makes this work special is the depth and power of
its message. Of all his symphonies, I feel that the Seventh goes the farthest emotionally,
and the range of intensity, color, and atmosphere make it a wonderful companion to the
Corigliano work being premiered on these concerts.
4
5
New York Philharmonic
6
7
Notes on the Program
By James M. Keller, Program Annotator
The Leni and Peter May Chair
Essay No. 1 for Orchestra,
Op. 12
Samuel Barber
In Short
Born: March 9, 1910, in West Chester, Pennsylvania
Died: January 23, 1981, in New York City
Work composed: 1937 through early 1938;
dedicated “To C.E.,” that is, to Carl Engel, then the
president of both the G. Schirmer publishing firm
and the American Musicological Society
Samuel Barber’s Essay No. 1 for Orchestra
was the work of a young composer firmly
on the way to a solid career. At The Curtis
Institute of Music, where he spent the years
1924 to 1932, Barber studied piano (with
Isabelle Vengerova), composition (with Rosario Scalero), and voice (with the baritone
Emilio de Gorgorza). In 1933 he chalked up
his first orchestral performance by a major
ensemble when The Philadelphia Orchestra played his Overture to The School for
Scandal, and he quickly began racking up
significant prizes, including Pulitzer traveling
fellowships and the Prix de Rome.
Barber’s talent was enhanced by fortunate
familial circumstances — most notably,
his aunt, the contralto Louise Homer, a
mainstay at The Metropolitan Opera, and her
husband, Sidney Homer, a well-known song
composer. Such connections never hurt a
budding career, and Barber was happy to
walk through the doors these relationships
opened for him. Another association that
benefited Barber was with the conductor
Arturo Toscanini, who became co-director
of the New York Philharmonic (with Willem
Mengelberg) in 1927 and was appointed
Principal Conductor (effectively music
director) for the years 1929 through 1936.
In August 1933 Barber and a fellow Curtis
student, his romantic partner Gian Carlo
Menotti, happened to pass near the conductor’s Italian villa in Lago Maggiore and
dropped in unannounced. (They probably
World premiere: November 5, 1938, in a broadcast
from New York City by Arturo Toscanini and the NBC
Symphony
New York Philharmonic premiere: July 2, 1946,
Fabien Sevitzky, conductor
would have been sent away but they introduced themselves as friends of a New York
music critic whom Toscanini admired; and
then there was the common ground of Aunt
Louise, who had performed with Toscanini.)
Toscanini took a liking to the two
young composers, and at some point he
floated the idea that he might be inclined
to con- duct a piece by Barber. Nothing
resulted immediately from this, but in 1937
Toscanini heard Barber’s Symphony in One
Movement at the Salzburg Festival. He
had been criticized for not championing
contemporary music, but he related to the
young American’s essentially conservative
style and thought that Barber could be a
modern voice that was in line with his personal taste. Toscanini had recently left the
Philharmonic and was now directing the
newly formed NBC Symphony, where he
thought a new work by a young American
composer might be just the ticket.
It was for this purpose that Barber
composed his Essay for Orchestra (or
Essay No. 1, as it became known after
8
Meeting the Maestro
an Essay No. 2 followed in 1942). It is a
single-movement work in two parts plus
a coda: an opening Andante sostenuto in
which the principal thematic material is
presented before speeding up to a nervous
Allegro molto and, at the very end, relaxing
again, to a brief Largamente sostenuto. The
doleful slow sections may call to mind Barber’s most familiar composition, his Adagio
for Strings (an arrangement of the slow
movement of the String Quartet, Op. 11 that
he had just written). In fact, when Barber
sent the score of his Essay to Toscanini, he
included a copy of the Adagio for Strings in
the same envelope.
Toscanini returned the two scores without
comment, meaning no offense; he soon realized, however, that his communication had
left something to be desired. When Menotti
visited Toscanini in Italy in the summer of
1938, Barber chose not to go along. Toscanini told Menotti: “Tell him not to be mad.
I’m not going to play one of his pieces. I’m
going to play both.” This he did on an NBC
Symphony broadcast in 1938, an event of
surpassing historical importance as it was
the first time the world heard Barber’s Adagio for Strings. It rather overshadowed the
piece at hand, but Toscanini took the Essay
just as seriously. Reviewing in The New York
Times, Olin Downes reported, “Toscanini
conducted the scores as if his reputation
rested upon the results.”
After he and Menotti first met Toscanini in
1933, Barber wrote a detailed letter to his
parents about what would become a valued and helpful friendship with the revered
conductor:
Much of the time I was walking alone
with him, tickled as a cat. Back at the
house he took G–C [Gian Carlo] and me
into his studio and showed us some of
his treasures — the last thing Wagner
wrote, never published, a most beautiful
couple of lines for the piano which he
stuck in the score of Parsifal when he
gave it to his wife on completion. Frau
Wagner gave it to Toscanini, and he
played it for us. ... He has a portrait of
Beethoven in his youth, the only one in
the world. He picked up two volumes
which he said he was never without —
Beethoven’s string quartets. (Owing to
his extreme myopia, the poor Maestro
did not realize that one of the cherished
volumes he was showing us happened
to be an “English Grammar Simplified
for Beginners.”) Then ... we had tea and
talked some more, and left in a daze of
enthusiasm for him and his house.
Instrumentation: two flutes, two oboes,
two clarinets, two bassoons, four horns,
three trumpets, three trombones, tuba,
timpani, piano, and strings.
9
Notes on the Program
By James M. Keller, Program Annotator
The Leni and Peter May Chair
One Sweet Morning,
for Mezzo-Soprano
and Orchestra
John Corigliano
In Short
Born: February 16, 1938, in New York City
Resides: in New York City and Kent Cliffs, New York
Work composed: 2011, co-commissioned by the
New York Philharmonic, Alan Gilbert, Music Director,
and the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, Long Yu,
Music Director
John Corigliano is among the most respected and highly honored of American composers; his Symphony No. 1 (1988) earned
him both the prestigious Grawemeyer
Award and the first of his four Grammy
awards. The work has been acknowledged
as one of the most compelling artistic statements related to the AIDS crisis.
Corigliano’s career has been filled with
distinctions: The Metropolitan Opera’s
production of his opera The Ghosts of
Versailles (1987) was the first time in two
decades that the company presented a
new work it had commissioned; in March
2000 he won an Academy Award for his
score for the film The Red Violin (music
that has become popular as a concert
work); in 2001 he was awarded the
Pulitzer Prize in Music for his Symphony
No. 2 (an expanded re-composition of his
1995 String Quartet); and in 2004 his
Symphony No. 3, subtitled Circus Maximus, for large wind orchestra, followed.
Since 1991 he has been a member of the
American Academy of Arts and Letters; in
1992 Musical America named him its first
Composer of the Year; and in 2002 he
was honored with the Gold Medal of The
National Arts Club in New York City.
Corigliano was born into a musical family: his father, also named John Corigliano,
served for more than two decades as con-
World premiere: these performances
certmaster of the New York Philharmonic.
The younger Corigliano studied with Otto
Luening at Columbia University and Vittorio Giannini at the Manhattan School of
Music; became a New York radio music
programmer; was a record producer for
Columbia Masterworks; and worked for
nearly a decade with Leonard Bernstein
on the CBS broadcasts of the New York
Philharmonic Young People’s Concerts.
The composer has come to embrace a
posture in which Romantic grandeur rubs
elbows with an unmistakably modernist
musical vocabulary.
Corigliano is on the composition faculty
of The Juilliard School, and also holds the
position of Distinguished Professor of
Music at Lehman College, City University
of New York. Recent works include his
Winging It for solo piano (2008), based on
some of his recorded improvisations, and
Stomp, a solo violin work composed as a
competition piece for this year’s International Tchaikovsky Competition, for which
he served on the jury.
One Sweet Morning similarly developed
from a pre-existing starting point, in this
case from a song he composed in 2005
10
In the Composer’s Words
When Alan Gilbert asked me to write a
work commemorating the 10th anniversary
of “9/11,” I frankly had no idea what to do.
I did know what not to do, and that was to
write a piece of abstract orchestral music.
Alan wanted a large-scale work — approximately a half hour in length. While I
could see writing an orchestral meditation,
I could not see extending that to a halfhour (Mahler notwithstanding).
And if I wrote a work that had meditative sections, but also dramatic and extroverted sections, then I would fall into a
terrible trap. So many in the audience of
this piece will have images of the frightful day itself — jet liners crashing into the
World Trade Center, people jumping to
their deaths from the top of the buildings, and the final collapse of the towers
themselves — burned into their retinas.
How can one hear music of any dramatic
surges without imagining these events
accompanying the music — or vice versa?
Inevitably, the piece would become a
tone poem of that unimaginable day —
something I never intended and did not
want. Yet how could I instruct the audience to ignore their own memories?
Obviously, then, I needed to write a
piece with words. I needed other images
both to refute and complement the alltoo-vivid ones we’d bring with us into the
concert hall. But which images; and how
would they pertain to the subject, as well
as to each other?
The answer was as obvious as it was
dispiriting. Ten years later, that day is more
calmly remembered as just one in a continuum of terrible days. September 11, 2001,
was discrete and specific: but war and its anguishes have been with us forever. I needed
a cycle of songs that would embed 9/11 into
that larger story. So I chose four poems (one
of them part of an epic poem) from different
ages and countries.
The first poem — Czesław Miłosz’s “A
Song on the End of the World,” written in
Warsaw in 1944 — sets a tranquil scene:
a vista of serenity that still hints at the
possibility of chaos to come. The poet’s
descriptions of everyday matters turn
chilling when he notes, “No one believes
it is happening now.” My setting for these
words is hushed and motionless, never
rising in volume and intensity.
Shattering the calm is the second poem:
that portion of Homer’s Iliad chronicling a
massacre led by the Greek prince Patroclus. Each kill is described in detail; the music, too, strives for the brutal and unsparing.
“War South of the Great Wall,” by the
8th century poet Li Po, follows. Its cool,
atmospheric language views a bloody
battle from a great remove: warriors
seem to swarm “like armies of ants.” The
narrator’s poise collapses only when she
reveals “my husband — my sons — you’ll
find them all out there, where the wardrums throb and throb.” Her anguish, and
the battle that is its cause, surge in an
orchestral interlude, climaxing with the
orchestra alone meditating on the narrator’s themes. The orchestra, diminishing in
intensity, introduces the poem that gives
the cycle its name: “One Sweet Morning,”
by E. Y. (“Yip”) Harburg, a name that might
surprise audiences who know it principally from his sparkling lyrics for such
plays and movies as The Wizard of Oz and
Finian’s Rainbow. But Harburg also wrote
a few volumes of light and not-so-light
verse, and it was in one of those that I
came upon this deep and tender lyric.
“One Sweet Morning” ends the cycle
with the dream of a world without war
— an impossible dream, perhaps, but
certainly one worth dreaming. In this
short poem, Harburg paints a beautiful
scene where “the rose will rise ... spring
will bloom ... peace will come .... one
sweet morning.”
— John Corigliano
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Notes on the Program
Texts
(continued)
John Corigliano’s One Sweet Morning, for Mezzo-Soprano and Orchestra
for voice and piano (on a poem by the Tin
Pan Alley and Broadway lyricist E.Y. “Yip”
Harburg), and then re-crafted for four-part
youth chorus, also in 2005. Corigliano
described the choral version as “an exalted
prayer for the future [that], when sung
by young people who are the future, has
special meaning.” That music, again revised,
became the conclusion of this new, fourmovement work for mezzo-soprano and
large orchestra; it is preceded by entirely
new settings of poems by Czesław Miłosz,
Homer, and Li Po.
A Song on the End of the World
On the day the world ends
A bee circles a clover,
A fisherman mends a glimmering net.
Happy porpoises jump in the sea,
By the rainspout young sparrows are playing
And the snake is gold-skinned as it should always be.
On the day the world ends
Women walk through the fields under their umbrellas,
A drunkard grows sleepy at the edge of a lawn,
Vegetable peddlers shout in the street
And a yellow-sailed boat comes nearer the island,
The voice of a violin lasts in the air
And leads into a starry night.
Instrumentation: three flutes (one doubling piccolo), three oboes, three clarinets
(one doubling E-flat clarinet and another
doubling bass clarinet), three bassoons (one
doubling contrabassoon), four horns, three
trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani,
vibraphone, orchestra bells, crotales, bass
drum, tam-tam, medium and high tomtoms, bell tree, snare drum, temple blocks,
suspended cymbal, slapstick, xylophone,
field drum, low drum, three bell plates,
whip, tenor drum, tambourine, triangle,
dagu (Chinese bass drum, specifically the
broad-based drum known as datanggu),
steel plate, crash cymbals, piano (doubling
celesta), harp, and strings, in addition to
the solo mezzo-soprano. “A Song on the
End of the World” also calls for harmonica.
And those who expected lightning and thunder
Are disappointed.
And those who expected signs and archangels’ trumps
Do not believe it is happening now.
As long as the sun and the moon are above,
As long as the bumblebee visits a rose,
As long as rosy infants are born
No one believes it is happening now.
Only a white-haired old man, who would be a prophet
Yet is not a prophet, for he’s much too busy,
Repeats while he binds his tomatoes:
There will be no other end of the world,
There will be no other end of the world.
— Czesław Miłosz, Warsaw, 1944 (translated by Anthony Miłosz)
Patroclus
Patroclus —
soon as the fighter cut their front battalions off
he swerved back to pin them against the warships,
never letting the Trojans stream back up to Troy
as they struggled madly on — but there mid-field
between the ships, the river and the beetling wall
Patroclus kept on sweeping in, hacking them down,
making them pay the price for Argives slaughtered.
There, Pronous first to fall — a glint of the spear
and Patroclus tore his chest left bare by the shield-rim,
loosed his knees and the man went crashing down.
And next he went for Thestor the son of Enops
(continued)
12
13
Texts (continued)
cowering, crouched in his fine polished chariot,
crazed with fear, and the reins flew from his grip —
Patroclus rising beside him stabbed his right jawbone,
ramming the spearhead square between his teeth so hard
he hooked him by that spearhead over the chariot-rail,
hoisted, dragged the Trojan out as an angler perched
on a jutting rock ledge drags some fish from the sea,
some noble catch, with line and glittering bronze hook.
So with the spear Patroclus gaffed him off his car,
his mouth gaping round the glittering point
and flipped him down face first,
dead as he fell, his life breath blown away.
And next he caught Erylaus closing, lunging in —
he flung a rock and it struck between his eyes
and the man’s whole skull split in his heavy helmet,
down the Trojan slammed on the ground, head-down
and courage-shattering Death engulfed his corpse.
Then in a blur of kills, Amphoterus, Erymas, Epaltes,
Tlepolemus son of Damastor, and Echius and Pyris,
Ipheus and Euippus and Polymelus the son of Argeas —
he crowded corpse on corpse on the earth that rears us all.
— from Homer’s The Iliad (translated by Robert Fagles)
War South of the Great Wall
Delirium, battlefields all dark and delirium,
convulsions of men seem like armies of ants.
A red wheel in thickened air, the sun hangs
above bramble and weed blood’s dyed purple,
One Sweet Morning
Out of the fallen leaves the autumn world over,
Out of the shattered rose that will smile no more,
Out of the embers of blossoms and ashes of clover
Spring will bloom — one sweet morning.
Out of the fallen lads the summer world over,
Out of their flags plowed under a distant shore,
Out of the dreams in their bones buried under the clover
Peace will come — one sweet morning.
“One sweet morning
The rose will rise
To wake the heart
And make it wise!”
This is the cry of life the winter world over,
“Sing me no sad amen, but a bright encore!”
For out of the flags and the bones buried under the clover,
Spring will bloom
Peace will come
One sweet morning —
One sweet morning.
— E.Y. “Yip” Harburg
Texts reprinted by arrangement with G. Schirmer, Inc.
and crows, their beaks clutching warrior guts,
struggle with flight, grief-glutted, earthbound.
Those on guard atop the Great Wall yesterday
became ghosts in its shadow today. And still,
flags bright everywhere like scattered stars,
the slaughter keeps on. War-drums throbbing:
my husband — my sons — you’ll find them all
out there where the war-drums throb and throb.
— Li Po, 8th Century (translated by David Hinton)
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15
Notes on the Program
(continued)
Symphony No. 7 in D minor,
Op. 70
Antonín Dvořák
In Short
Born: September 8, 1841, in Mühlhausen
(Nelahozeves), Bohemia
Died: May 1, 1904, in Prague
Work composed: December 13, 1884–March 17, 1885;
slightly revised just after its premiere; “Composed for
the Philharmonic Society of London”
During his formative years, Antonín
Dvořák’s musical training was modest
and he was a competent, but hardly
distinguished pupil. As a teenager he managed to secure a spot as violist in a dance
orchestra. The group prospered, and in
1862 its members formed the founding
core of the Provisional Theatre orchestra
in Prague. Dvořák would play principal
viola in that ensemble for nine years, in
which capacity he sat directly beneath
the batons of such conductors as Bedřich
Smetana and Richard Wagner.
During that time Dvořák also honed
his skills as a composer, and by 1871 he
felt compelled to leave the orchestra and
devote himself full-time to composing. In
1874 he received his first real break as a
composer: he was awarded the Austrian
State Stipendium, a grant newly created by
the Ministry of Education to assist young,
poor, gifted musicians — which perfectly
defined Dvořák’s status at the time, as
well as in 1876 and 1877, when he again
received the same prize. Providentially, the
powerful music critic Eduard Hanslick took
a liking to some of his music, and in 1877
encouraged him to send some scores
to Johannes Brahms. The great German
composer in turn recommended Dvořák to
his own publisher, Simrock, who immediately contracted a first option on all of the
younger composer’s new works.
World premiere: April 22, 1885, the composer
conducting, in a concert of the Royal Philharmonic
Society at St. James’s Hall in London
New York Philharmonic premiere: January 9, 1886,
Theodore Thomas, conductor; this was the work’s U.S.
premiere
The spirit of Brahms hovers over many
pages of Dvořák’s Seventh Symphony,
which is undoubtedly the darkest and potentially the most intimidating of his nine.
His Sixth Symphony, in D major, composed
four years earlier, had also seemed to be
a response to Brahms, its pastoral mood
emulating to a certain extent Brahms’s recent Second Symphony (1877), also in D
major. Since then Brahms had released a
further symphony — his confident, sinewy
Third, which Hans Richter (who conducted
its premiere in December 1883) dubbed
“Brahms’s Eroica.” A month later, in January 1884, Dvořák traveled to Berlin to
hear it performed and was appropriately
impressed, and by the end of that year
he began to write his Seventh Symphony,
which echoes some of the storminess
and monumental power of Brahms’s Third.
What’s more, Dvořák kept in touch with
Brahms as he was working on the
symphony. In February 1885 Dvořák
wrote to Simrock:
16
movement and communicated the emendation to Simrock with the assurance, “Now I
am convinced that there is not a single superfluous note in the work.” It would be hard
to disagree with him; from a composer who
was sometimes given to leisurely rhapsody,
the Seventh Symphony is remarkably taut
and rigorous throughout.
I have been engaged on a new symphony
for a long, long time; after all it must be
something really worthwhile, for I don’t
want Brahms’s words to me, “I imagine
your symphony quite different from this one
[i.e., Dvořák’s Sixth],” to remain unfulfilled.
In the early 1880s, as his reputation grew,
Dvořák gained a particularly staunch following in England; the rapturous reception of
his Stabat Mater when it was performed in
London in 1883 made him a true celebrity
there. On the heels of that triumph, the
Royal Philharmonic invited him to conduct
some concerts in 1884, in the course of
which his Sixth Symphony made such an
impression that the orchestra immediately
extended a commission to Dvořák to write
one specifically for them, which he should
conduct the following season. As one
might have predicted, the new work — the
Seventh Symphony — scored another
English success for its composer. Just after
the premiere Dvořák wrote to a friend in
Mirovice, Bohemia:
Instrumentation: two flutes (one doubling
piccolo), two oboes, two clarinets, two
bassoons, four horns, two trumpets, three
trombones, timpani, and strings.
Before this letter reaches Mirovice you
will perhaps know how things turned out
here. Splendidly, really splendidly. This time,
too, the English again welcomed me as
heartily and as demonstratively as always
heretofore. The symphony was immensely
successful and at the next performance
will be a still greater success.
Following the English performances
Dvořák edited a passage of about 40
measures out of the symphony’s second
17
New York Philharmonic
ALAN GILBERT
Marilyn Dubow
Ru-Pei Yeh
Music Director
The Yoko Nagae Ceschina Chair
The Sue and Eugene Mercy, Jr. Chair
The Credit Suisse Chair
in honor of Paul Calello
Case Scaglione
Joshua Weilerstein
Assistant Conductors
Leonard Bernstein
Laureate Conductor, 1943–1990
Kurt Masur
Music Director Emeritus
VIOLINS
Glenn Dicterow
Concertmaster
The Charles E. Culpeper Chair
Sheryl Staples
Principal Associate Concertmaster
The Elizabeth G. Beinecke Chair
Michelle Kim
Martin Eshelman
Quan Ge
The Gary W. Parr Chair
Judith Ginsberg
Stephanie Jeong+
Hanna Lachert
Hyunju Lee
Joo Young Oh
Daniel Reed
Mark Schmoockler
Na Sun
Vladimir Tsypin
VIOLAS
Cynthia Phelps
Principal
The Mr. and Mrs. Frederick P. Rose
Chair
Alucia Scalzo++
Amy Zoloto++
Wei Yu
Wilhelmina Smith++
E-FLAT CLARINET
BASSES
BASS CLARINET
Timothy Cobb++
Acting Principal
The Redfield D. Beckwith Chair
Orin O’Brien*
Acting Associate Principal
The Herbert M. Citrin Chair
William Blossom
The Ludmila S. and Carl B. Hess
Chair
Randall Butler
David J. Grossman
Satoshi Okamoto
Pascual Martinez Forteza
Amy Zoloto++
BASSOONS
Judith LeClair
Principal
The Pels Family Chair
Kim Laskowski*
Roger Nye
Arlen Fast
BASS TROMBONE
James Markey
The Daria L. and William C. Foster Chair
Principal
Principal
The Carlos Moseley Chair
Kyle Zerna**
PERCUSSION
Christopher S. Lamb
Arlen Fast
The Mr. and Mrs. Ronald J. Ulrich Chair
Daniel Druckman*
Kyle Zerna
The Norma and Lloyd Chazen Chair
Robert Langevin
Philip Myers
Enrico Di Cecco
Carol Webb
Yoko Takebe
Principal
The Lila Acheson Wallace Chair
Principal
The Ruth F. and Alan J. Broder Chair
HARP
Stewart Rose++*
Nancy Allen
Katherine Greene
Sandra Church*
Mindy Kaufman
Hae-Young Ham
The Mr. and Mrs. William J.
McDonough Chair
PICCOLO
The Mr. and Mrs. Timothy M. George
Chair
Lisa GiHae Kim
Kuan-Cheng Lu
Newton Mansfield
The Edward and Priscilla Pilcher
Chair
Dawn Hannay
Vivek Kamath
Peter Kenote
Kenneth Mirkin
Judith Nelson
Robert Rinehart
Mindy Kaufman
Principal
The Alice Tully Chair
The Mr. and Mrs. G. Chris Andersen
Chair
Sherry Sylar*
Robert Botti
The Shirley Bacot Shamel Chair
CELLOS
The Lizabeth and Frank Newman Chair
Fiona Simon
Sharon Yamada
Elizabeth Zeltser
Carter Brey
Kerry McDermott
Anna Rabinova
Charles Rex
The William and Elfriede Ulrich Chair
Yulia Ziskel
Marc Ginsberg
Principal
The Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Chair
Eileen Moon*
ENGLISH HORN
The Joan and Joel Smilow Chair
The Paul and Diane Guenther Chair
CLARINETS
Eric Bartlett
Ricardo Morales
Principal Designate
Principal
The Shirley and Jon Brodsky
Foundation Chair
Lisa Kim*
Maria Kitsopoulos
Acting Principal
The Edna and W. Van Alan Clark
Chair
In Memory of Laura Mitchell
Soohyun Kwon
The Joan and Joel I. Picket Chair
Duoming Ba
Elizabeth Dyson
The Mr. and Mrs. James E. Buckman Chair
Sumire Kudo
Qiang Tu
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Acting Associate Principal
Cara Kizer Aneff
R. Allen Spanjer
Howard Wall
David Smith++
OBOES
Liang Wang
Mark Nuccio
Lawrence Rock
Markus Rhoten
FLUTES
Dorian Rence
AUDIO DIRECTOR
TIMPANI
HORNS
Assistant Concertmaster
The William Petschek Family Chair
Louis J. Patalano
Alan Baer
Rebecca Young*
Irene Breslaw**
TRUMPETS
Philip Smith
Principal
The Paula Levin Chair
Matthew Muckey*
Ethan Bensdorf
Thomas V. Smith
TROMBONES
Joseph Alessi
Principal
The Gurnee F. and Marjorie L. Hart
Chair
Principal
The Mr. and Mrs. William T. Knight III
Chair
KEYBOARD
In Memory of Paul Jacobs
HARPSICHORD
Lionel Party
PIANO
The Karen and Richard S. LeFrak
Chair
Harriet Wingreen
Jonathan Feldman
ORGAN
Kent Tritle
David Finlayson
LIBRARIANS
The Donna and Benjamin M. Rosen
Chair
Principal
Carl R. Schiebler
STAGE REPRESENTATIVE
TUBA
Principal
The Constance R. Hoguet Friends of the Philharmonic Chair
CONTRABASSOON
ORCHESTRA PERSONNEL
MANAGER
Lawrence Tarlow
Sandra Pearson**
Sara Griffin**
Pascual Martinez Forteza*
Acting Associate Principal
The Honey M. Kurtz Family Chair
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* Associate Principal
** Assistant Principal
+ On Leave
++Replacement/Extra
The New York Philharmonic uses
the revolving seating method for
section string players who are listed
alphabetically in the roster.
HONORARY MEMBERS
OF THE SOCIETY
Emanuel Ax
Pierre Boulez
Stanley Drucker
Lorin Maazel
Zubin Mehta
Carlos Moseley
The Music Director
Music Director Alan Gilbert, The Yoko
Nagae Ceschina Chair, began his tenure
at the New York Philharmonic in September 2009, launching what New York
magazine called “a fresh future for the
Philharmonic.” His creative approach to
programming combines works in fresh and
innovative ways, and he has developed
artistic partnerships, including the positions of The Marie-Josée Kravis Composerin-Residence and The Mary and James
G. Wallach Artist-in-Residence; an annual
three-week festival; and CONTACT!, the
new-music series. The first native New
Yorker to hold the post, he has sought to
make the Orchestra a point of civic pride
for the city as well as for the country.
During the 2011–12 season Alan
Gilbert conducts world premieres, three
Mahler symphonies, a residency at London’s Barbican Centre, tours to Europe
and California, and a season-concluding
musical exploration of space that features Stockhausen’s theatrical immersion,
Gruppen, to be given at the Park Avenue
Armory. Highlights of the previous season
include two tours of European music
capitals, Carnegie Hall’s 120th Anniversary Concert, and an acclaimed production
of Janáček’s The Cunning Little Vixen,
hailed by The Washington Post as “another
victory,” building on 2010’s wildly successful staging of Ligeti’s Le Grand Macabre,
which The New York Times called “an
instant Philharmonic milestone.” Other
highlights of Mr. Gilbert’s inaugural season
comprise the Asian Horizons tour in
October 2009, which included the Orches20
tra’s Vietnam debut at the historic Hanoi
Opera House; the EUROPE / WINTER
2010 tour; world premieres; and chamber
performances as violinist and violist with
Philharmonic musicians.
In September 2011 Alan Gilbert became
Director of Conducting and Orchestral
Studies at The Juilliard School, where he is
also the first to hold the William Schuman
Chair in Musical Studies. He is Conductor
Laureate of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra and Principal Guest
Conductor of Hamburg’s NDR Symphony
Orchestra; he regularly conducts leading orchestras in the U.S. and abroad. His
2011–12 season engagements include
appearances with the Munich Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony, Cleveland
Orchestra, Orchestre Philharmonique de
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Radio France, Royal Swedish Opera, and
the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic.
Alan Gilbert made his acclaimed
Metropolitan Opera debut in November
2008 leading John Adams’s Doctor Atomic. His recordings have been
nominated for Grammy Awards, and his
recording of Mahler’s Symphony No. 9
received top honors from the Chicago
Tribune and Gramophone magazine. Mr.
Gilbert studied at Harvard University, The
Curtis Institute of Music, and The Juilliard School, and served as the assistant
conductor of The Cleveland Orchestra
(1995–97). In May 2010 he received
an Honorary Doctor of Music from The
Curtis Institute of Music.
The Artist
Met, and Halle orchestras; the Orchestra
of the Age of Enlightenment; and at the
Tanglewood and Mostly Mozart festivals
and the BBC Proms. She has given recitals at Zankel Hall, Alice Tully Hall, 92nd
Street Y, Town Hall, and The Metropolitan
Museum of Art in New York; Vocal Arts
Society in Washington, D.C.; Cleveland
Art Song Festival; and Ravinia Festival in
Chicago, among others.
Ms. Blythe recently starred in The
Metropolitan Opera’s live HD broadcasts
of Orfeo ed Euridice and Il trittico. She also
recorded Alan Smith’s Covered Wagon
Woman with The Chamber Music Society
of Lincoln Center for the CMS Studio
Recording label; her recordings of works
by Mahler, Brahms, and Wagner, and arias
by Handel and Bach are available on the
Virgin Classics label.
Mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe has
appeared in the great opera houses of the
world including The Metropolitan Opera,
Lyric Opera of Chicago, San Francisco
Opera, Paris Opéra, and Royal Opera
House, Covent Garden. Her numerous
operatic protagonists include the title roles
in Bizet’s Carmen, Saint-Saëns’s Samson
et Dalila, Offenbach’s La Grande-Duchesse
de Gérolstein, Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice,
Handel’s Guilio Cesare, and Isabella in
Rossini’s L’italiana in Algeri. She has also
portrayed Frugola, Principessa, and Zita
in Puccini’s Il trittico; Amneris in Verdi’s
Aida; Azucena in Verdi’s Il Trovatore; Ulrica
in Verdi’s Un ballo in maschera; Fricka in
Wagner’s Das Rheingold and Die Walküre;
and Mistress Quickly in Verdi’s Falstaff. In
the 2011–12 season she returns to The
Metropolitan Opera for Handel’s Rodelinda, Aida, and the complete Ring Cycle.
An accomplished concert singer, she
has appeared with the New York Philharmonic; Boston, Chicago, and San Francisco
symphony orchestras; Philadelphia, The
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New York Philharmonic
The New York Philharmonic, founded
in 1842 by a group of local musicians
led by American-born Ureli Corelli Hill,
is by far the oldest symphony orchestra
in the United States, and one of the
oldest in the world. It currently plays
some 180 concerts a year, and on May 5,
2010, gave its 15,000th concert — a
milestone unmatched by any other symphony orchestra in the world.
Music Director Alan Gilbert, The Yoko
Nagae Ceschina Chair, began his tenure
in September 2009, the latest in a distinguished line of 20th-century musical
giants that has included Lorin Maazel
(2002–09); Kurt Masur (Music Director
1991–2002, Music Director Emeritus
since 2002); Zubin Mehta (1978–91);
Pierre Boulez (1971–77); and Leonard
Bernstein (appointed Music Director in
1958; given the lifetime title of Laureate
Conductor in 1969).
Since its inception the Orchestra has
championed the new music of its time,
commissioning and/or premiering many
important works, such as Dvořák’s
Symphony No. 9, From the New World;
Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3;
Gershwin’s Piano Concerto in F; and
Copland’s Connotations. The Philharmonic
has also given the U.S. premieres of such
works as Beethoven’s Symphonies Nos. 8
and 9 and Brahms’s Symphony No. 4. This
pioneering tradition has continued to the
present day, with works of major contemporary composers regularly scheduled
each season, including John Adams’s Pulitzer Prize– and Grammy Award–winning
On the Transmigration of Souls; Melinda
Wagner’s Trombone Concerto; Esa-Pekka
Salonen’s Piano Concerto; Magnus Lindberg’s EXPO and Al largo; Wynton Marsalis’s Swing Symphony (Symphony No. 3);
Christopher Rouse’s Odna Zhizn; and, by
the end of the 2010–11 season, 11 works
in CONTACT!, the new-music series.
The roster of composers and conductors
who have led the Philharmonic includes
such historic figures as Theodore Thomas,
Antonín Dvořák, Gustav Mahler (music director 1909–11), Otto Klemperer, Richard
Strauss, Willem Mengelberg (Music Director 1922–30), Wilhelm Furtwängler, Arturo
Toscanini (Music Director 1928–36), Igor
Stravinsky, Aaron Copland, Bruno Walter
(Music Advisor 1947–49), Dimitri Mitropoulos (Music Director 1949–58), Klaus
Tennstedt, George Szell (Music Advisor
1969–70), and Erich Leinsdorf.
Long a leader in American musical life,
the Philharmonic has become renowned
around the globe, appearing in 430 cities
in 63 countries on 5 continents. Under
Alan Gilbert’s leadership, the Orchestra
made its Vietnam debut at the Hanoi Opera House in October 2009. In February
2008 the Philharmonic, conducted by then
Music Director Lorin Maazel, gave a historic performance in Pyongyang, D.P.R.K.,
earning the 2008 Common Ground
Award for Cultural Diplomacy. In 2012 the
Philharmonic becomes an International
Associate of London’s Barbican Centre.
The Philharmonic has long been a media pioneer, having begun radio broadcasts
in 1922, and is currently represented by
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The New York Philharmonic This Week
— syndicated nationally and internationally 52 weeks per year, and available
at nyphil.org. It continues its television
presence on Live From Lincoln Center on
PBS, and in 2003 made history as the
first symphony orchestra ever to perform
live on the Grammy Awards. Since 1917
the Philharmonic has made nearly 2,000
recordings, and in 2004 became the
first major American orchestra to offer
downloadable concerts, recorded live.
Since June 2009 more than 50 concerts
have been released as downloads, and
the Philharmonic’s self-produced recordings will continue with Alan Gilbert and the
New York Philharmonic: 2011–12 Season,
comprising 12 releases. Famous for its
long-running Young People’s Concerts, the
Philharmonic has developed a wide range
of educational programs, among them the
School Partnership Program that enriches
music education in New York City, and
Learning Overtures, which fosters international exchange among educators.
Credit Suisse is the Global Sponsor of
the New York Philharmonic.
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New York Philharmonic
Executive Producer: Vince Ford
Producers: Lawrence Rock and Mark Travis
Recording and Mastering Engineer: Lawrence Rock
Photos of Alan Gilbert and the New York Philharmonic: Chris Lee
John Corigliano's One Sweet Morning used with permission from G. Schirmer, Inc.
Major funding for this recording is provided to the New York Philharmonic by
Rita E. and Gustave M. Hauser.
Alan Gilbert, Music Director, holds The Yoko Nagae Ceschina Chair.
This concert is made possible, in part, by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.
The commissioning of One Sweet Morning is supported in part by The Koussevitzky Music
Foundation.
Guest artist appearances are made possible through the Hedwig van Ameringen Guest Artists
Endowment Fund.
Exclusive timepiece of the New York Philharmonic
Classical 105.9 FM WQXR is the Radio Home of the New York Philharmonic.
Instruments made possible, in part, by The Richard S. and Karen LeFrak Endowment Fund.
Programs are supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural
Affairs, New York State Council on the Arts, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
Steinway is the Official Piano of the New York Philharmonic and Avery Fisher Hall.
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New York Philharmonic
Performed, produced, and distributed
by the New York Philharmonic
© 2011 New York Philharmonic
NYP 20120101
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