Boston Symphony Orchestra

Performers

• Boston Symphony Orchestra
  James Levine, Music Director and Conductor
• Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Piano
• Steven Ansell, Viola

Program

• ELLIOTT CARTER Dialogues, for Piano and Orchestra
• BERLIOZ Harold in Italy
• RAVEL Piano Concerto for the Left Hand
• RAVEL Daphnis et Chloé Suite No. 2
• 
  Program is approximately 2 hours, including one intermission

Bios

• James Levine, Music Director and Conductor
  
  Now in his sixth season as Music Director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, James Levine is the BSO's 14th music director since the orchestra's founding in 1881 and the first American-born conductor to hold that position. Highlights of Maestro Levine's 2009–2010 Boston Symphony programs, four of which travel to Carnegie Hall, include a Beethoven symphony cycle (the orchestra's first on subscription concerts in 75 years); the premieres of commissioned works from Peter Lieberson (Farewell Songs for baritone and orchestra), Elliott Carter (Flute Concerto), and John Harbison (Double Concerto for violin and cello); the premiere of John Williams's On Willows and Birches, written for former BSO harp principal Ann Hobson Pilot; Mendelssohn's Elijah (in its first Boston Symphony performances since 1982); a Pension Fund Concert featuring all four Strausses (both Johanns, Josef, and Richard); and music of Berg, Berlioz, Brahms, Debussy, Mahler, Mozart, Ravel, Schubert, and Stravinsky.
  
  Mr. Levine's programming each year balances orchestral, operatic, and choral classics with significant music of the 20th and 21st centuries, including newly commissioned works from such leading American composers as Babbitt, Carter, Harbison, Kirchner, Lieberson, Schuller, and Wuorinen. At Tanglewood each summer he also leads TMC classes devoted to orchestral repertoire, lieder, and opera. James Levine and the Boston Symphony Orchestra made their first European tour together following the 2007 Tanglewood season; at Tanglewood in 2008 he was Festival Director for the Elliott Carter Centenary Celebration marking the composer's 100th-birthday year.
  
  Maestro Levine is also Music Director of the Metropolitan Opera, where, in the 38 years since his debut there, he has led nearly 2,500 performances of 85 different operas, including 15 company premieres. This season at the Met he conducts new productions of Tosca and Les Contes d'Hoffmann and revivals of Simon Boccanegra and Lulu, as well as concerts at Carnegie Hall with the MET Orchestra and MET Chamber Ensemble. Also a distinguished pianist, Maestro Levine is an active chamber music and recital collaborator, especially in lieder and song repertoire with the world's great singers.

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• Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Piano
  
  Widely acclaimed as a key figure in the music of our time and a leading interpreter of the standard piano repertoire, Pierre-Laurent Aimard enjoys an internationally celebrated career that transcends traditional boundaries. In recent seasons he has been invited by Carnegie Hall, Vienna's Konzerthaus, Berlin's Philharmonie, the Palais Garnier/Opéra de Paris, Lucerne Festival, Mozarteum Salzburg, the Cleveland Orchestra, and Cité de la Musique, Paris, for "Carte Blanche" and residency projects, performing chamber music, lieder, solo piano, and orchestral programs. He curated the Southbank Centre's Messiaen centenary festival in 2008, marked his first year as artistic director of the Aldeburgh Festival in June 2009, and was awarded Germany's Schallplattenkritik Honorary Prize in December 2009. Highlights of his 2009–2010 season include an "Auftakt" residency at the Alte Oper Frankfurt (a joint piano recital with Tamara Stefanovich, lieder with Christine Schäfer, and chamber music with instrumentalists from the Chamber Orchestra of Europe) and solo recitals in Paris, New York, Rome, Madrid, Vienna, and Berlin. He returns to the Berliner Philharmoniker, London Symphony Orchestra, and Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, joins the Britten Sinfonia as soloist and director, and appears as soloist on consecutive nights at Carnegie Hall with the Chicago Symphony and Boston Symphony. Mr. Aimard holds professorships in Cologne and Paris, gives concert/lectures and workshops worldwide, and recently led classes and seminars at the College de France, Paris. The recipient of the Royal Philharmonic Society's Instrumentalist Award in spring 2005, he was Musical America's 2007 Instrumentalist of the Year.
  
  Born in Lyon, France, in 1957, Pierre-Laurent Aimard studied at the Paris Conservatoire with Yvonne Loriod and in London with Maria Curçio. Early career landmarks included first prize in the 1973 Messiaen Competition, and his appointment at age 19, by Pierre Boulez, as the Ensemble InterContemporain's first solo pianist. For more than 15 years he collaborated closely with György Ligeti, recording his complete works. Mr. Aimard now records exclusively for Deutsche Grammophon. His most recent releases include recital discs of Ravel, Carter, and Schumann; Mozart piano concertos with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, directed by him from the keyboard; and Hommage à Messiaen, a disc of solo piano works.
  

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• Steven Ansell, Viola
  
  Steven Ansell joined the Boston Symphony Orchestra as principal viola in September 1996, having already appeared with the orchestra in Symphony Hall as guest principal viola. A native of Seattle, he also remains a member of the acclaimed Muir String Quartet, which he co-founded in 1979 and with which he has toured worldwide. A graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music, where he studied with Michael Tree and Karen Tuttle, Mr. Ansell was named professor of viola at the University of Houston at 21 and became assistant principal viola of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra under André Previn at 23. As a recording artist he has received two Grand Prix du Disque awards and a Gramophone magazine award for Best Chamber Music Recording of the Year. He has appeared on PBS's In Performance at the White House and has participated in the Tanglewood, Marlboro, Schleswig-Holstein, Newport, Blossom, Spoleto, and Snowbird music festivals. Mr. Ansell teaches at the Boston University College of Fine Arts. As principal viola of the BSO, he is also a member of the Boston Symphony Chamber Players. Mr. Ansell's solo performances with the Boston Symphony Orchestra have included Mozart's Sinfonia concertante for violin and viola; Berlioz's Harold in Italy (under Emmanuel Krivine as well as James Levine); Bruch's Concerto for Viola, Clarinet, and Orchestra; and Strauss's Don Quixote.

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