Press Center

CARNEGIE HALL PRESENTS MUSICDIRECTOR ALAN GILBERT LEADING
THE NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC ON NOVEMBER 12 AT 8:00 PM

Program Includes John Adams’s Harmonielehre,
Marking 25th Anniversary of Work’s Premiere

Midori Featured as Guest Soloist in Beethoven’s Violin Concerto 

On Friday, November 12 at 8:00 p.m., Carnegie Hall presentsthe New York Philharmonic, led by Music Director Alan Gilbert, ina program of John Adams’s Harmonielehre and Beethoven’s Violin Concertoin D Major featuring Midori as soloist.

This is the first of two appearances by Mr. Gilbert and the New YorkPhilharmonic this season at Carnegie Hall. They return to perform at CarnegieHall’s 120th Anniversary Concert on May 5, 2011 with soloists violinist GilShaham, cellist Yo-Yo Ma, pianist Emanuel Ax, and vocalist Audra McDonald.Violinist Midori also appears later this season at Carnegie Hall, performingtwo programs—a solo recital on March 23 and a chamber music program on April 5—aspart of JapanNYC, Carnegie Hall’s extensive citywide festivalcelebrating Japanese culture.

25th Anniversary of John Adams’s Harmonielehre
The title of Adams’s Harmonielehre, which celebrates the 25thanniversary of its premiere this year, is roughly translated as “the book ofharmony” or “treatise on harmony” and is borrowed from the title ofSchoenberg’s extensive 1911 study of tonal harmony in which the composer moreor less renounced the laws of tonality. It was this moment in time, in whichthe course of music history would be changed forever, that Adams focuses on inhis massive, three-movement Harmonielehre. Throughout the work, Adams,who can claim a connection to Schoenberg through his teacher Leon Kirchner,combines the developmental techniques of Minimalism with the harmonic structureof late Romanticism—shades of Mahler, Sibelius, Debussy, and early Schoenbergbeing very present—to address this pivotal shift in composition. Calling hiswork “parody of a different sort…without the intent to ridicule,” Adamsaddresses what Schoenberg means to him:

                He was a "master" in the same sense that Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms
                were masters. That notion in itself appealed to me then and continues to
                do so. But Schoenberg also represented to me something twisted and
                contorted. He was the first composer to assume the role of high-priest,
                a creative mind whose entire life ran unfailingly against the grain of society,
                almost as if he had chosen the role of irritant. Despite my respect for and
                even intimidation by the persona of Schoenberg, I felt it only honest to
                acknowledge that I profoundly disliked the sound of twelve-tone music.
                His aesthetic was to me an overripening of 19th century Individualism,
                one in which the composer was a god of sorts, to which the listener would
                come as if to a sacramental altar. It was with Schoenberg that the "agony
                of modern music" had been born, and it was no secret that the classical
                music audience during the twentieth century was rapidly shrinking, in no small
                part because of the aural ugliness of so much of the new work being written.

In a review of a 1995 performance bythe San Francisco Symphony (which premiered the work on March 21, 1985) the SanFrancisco Chronicle said “the music is beautiful, subtle, dramaticallyforceful and exquisitely scored…Harmonielehre also reaches beyond its40-minute span to address larger issues of musical style and history. It doesso with thrilling ambition and equally thrilling success.”

About the Artists
The violinist Midori is recognized for the evolution and scope of hercareer—which began 28 years ago with a performance with the New YorkPhilharmonic—and increasingly for innovative community engagement initiativesworldwide. Named a Messenger of Peace by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in2007, she has created a model for young artists who seek to balance the joysand demands of a performing career at the highest level with a hands-on investmentin the power of music to change lives. Midori's involvement with communityengagement began in earnest in 1992 and to date over 180,000 children haveparticipated in Midori & Friends programs in every borough of NewYork City. Midori’s 2010–2011 season includes performances at the Ravinia,Schleswig-Holstein, Caramoor, and Edinburgh festivals, and will continue withover 100 concerts in 19 countries. Midori will appear with the BBC Symphony,the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic, the LondonSymphony Orchestra, and the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, among others,with such conductors Christoph Eschenbach, Sir Donald Runnicles, Kent Nagano,Alan Gilbert, Antonio Pappano, and Edo de Waart. She will make her fifthrecital tour devoted entirely to new music, which will culminate in aperformance in Zankel Hall on March 23 as part of Carnegie Hall’s JapanNYCfestival. Midori also performs chamber music with violist Nobuko Imai, cellistAntoine Lederlin, and pianist Jonathan Biss on April 5 as part of the festival.Midori was born in Osaka, Japan, in 1971 and began studying the violin with hermother, Setsu Goto, at a very early age. In 1982, when Zubin Mehta first heardher play, he was so impressed that he invited her to be a surprise guestsoloist for the New York Philharmonic's New Year's Eve concert.

Alan Gilbert became Music Director of the New York Philharmonic inSeptember 2009, the first native New Yorker to hold the post. In his inauguralseason he introduced a number of new initiatives: the positions of TheMarie-Josée Kravis Composer-in-Residence, held by Magnus Lindberg; The Mary andJames G. Wallach Artist-in-Residence, held in 2010–11 by violinist Anne-SophieMutter; an annual three-week festival, which in 2010–11 is titled HungarianEchoes, led by Esa-Pekka Salonen; and CONTACT!, the New YorkPhilharmonic’s new-music series. In the 2010–11 season Mr. Gilbert is leadingthe orchestra on two tours of European music capitals; two performances atCarnegie Hall, including the venue’s 120th Anniversary Concert on May 5; and astaged presentation of Janáček’s The Cunning Little Vixen. Highlights ofhis inaugural season included major tours of Asia and Europe and an acclaimedstaged presentation of Ligeti’s Le Grand Macabre. Mr. Gilbert is thefirst person to hold the William Schuman Chair in Musical Studies at TheJuilliard School, and is conductor laureate of the Royal Stockholm PhilharmonicOrchestra and principal guest conductor of Hamburg’s NDR Symphony Orchestra. Hehas conducted other leading orchestras in the U.S. and abroad, including theBoston, Chicago, and San Francisco symphony orchestras; Los AngelesPhilharmonic; Cleveland and Philadelphia Orchestras; the BerlinerPhilharmoniker, Munich’s Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, and Amsterdam’sRoyal Concertgebouw Orchestra. From 2003 to 2006 he served as the first musicdirector of the Santa Fe Opera and in 2008 made his Metropolitan Opera debutconducting John Adams’s Doctor Atomic. On May 15, 2010, Mr. Gilbertreceived an Honorary Doctor of Music degree from The Curtis Institute of Music.

Founded in 1842, the New York Philharmonic is the oldest symphonyorchestra in the United States and one of the oldest in the world. On May 5,2010, it performed its 15,000th concert. The orchestra has always played aleading role in American musical life, championing the music of its time, andis renowned around the globe, having appeared in 429 cities in 62 countries —including its 2009 debut in Vietnam, and its 2008 historic visit to Pyongyang,DPRK. The Philharmonic’s concerts are broadcast on the weekly syndicated radioprogram; The New York Philharmonic This Week, which is streamed on theorchestra’s website, nyphil.org; and are telecast annually on Live FromLincoln Center on U.S. public television. The Philharmonic has made nearly2,000 recordings since 1917, with more than 500 currently available. The firstmajor American orchestra to offer downloadable concerts, recorded live, thePhilharmonic, in 2009–10, released the first-ever classical iTunes Pass. Theorchestra has built on the long-running Young People’s Concerts® to develop awide range of education programs, including the School Partnership Program,enriching music education in New York City, and Learning Overtures, fosteringinternational exchange. Alan Gilbert became Music Director in September 2009,succeeding Lorin Maazel in a distinguished line of musical giants.


Program Information
Friday, November 12 at 8:00 p.m.
Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage
NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC
Alan Gilbert, Music Director and Conductor
Midori, Violin

LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN Violin Concerto in D Major, Op. 61
JOHN ADAMS Harmonielehre

Pre-concert talk starts at 7:00 p.m. in Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage withThomas Cabaniss, Composer & Faculty, The Juilliard School.

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