CARNEGIE HALL PRESENTS
National Youth Orchestra of the United States of America
Part of: Carnegie Hall Live on WQXR
For anyone 18 years old or younger, tickets are only $10. Please call CarnegieCharge at 212-247-7800 or visit the Box Office.
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Performers
Sir Antonio Pappano, Conductor
Isabel Leonard, Mezzo-Soprano
Program
BERLIOZ Les nuits d'été
R. STRAUSS Eine Alpensinfonie
Event Duration
The printed program will last approximately two hours, including one 20-minute intermission. Please note that there will be no late seating before intermission.Lead Donors: Hope and Robert F. Smith, Marina Kellen French and the Anna-Maria and Stephen Kellen Foundation, The Kovner Foundation, Beatrice Santo Domingo, and Nicola and Beatrice Bulgari.
Global Ambassadors: Hope and Robert F. Smith, and Maggie and Richard Tsai.
NYO-USA Sponsor: United Airlines®, Official Airline of Carnegie Hall.
Major funding has been provided by The Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation, The Carl Jacobs Foundation, and JMCMRJ Sorrell Foundation.
Additional funding has been provided by Sarah Arison, The Jack Benny Family Foundation, Ann and Gordon Getty Foundation, Mary Anne Huntsman Morgan and The Huntsman Foundation, and Jolyon Stern and Nelle Nugent.
Major funding has been provided by The Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation, The Carl Jacobs Foundation, and JMCMRJ Sorrell Foundation.
Additional funding has been provided by Sarah Arison, The Jack Benny Family Foundation, Ann and Gordon Getty Foundation, Mary Anne Huntsman Morgan and The Huntsman Foundation.
Public funding has been provided by the U.S. Department of State, Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.
Founder Patrons: Blavatnik Family Foundation; Nicola and Beatrice Bulgari; The Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation; Marina Kellen French and the Anna-Maria and Stephen Kellen Foundation; The Harold W. McGraw, Jr. Family Foundation; Ronald O. Perelman; Robertson Foundation; Beatrice Santo Domingo; Hope and Robert F. Smith; Sarah Billinghurst Solomon and Howard Solomon; and Joan and Sanford I. Weill and the Weill Family Foundation.
At a Glance
This concert presents two works renowned for their daring experiments in color. Berlioz’s Les nuits d’été—a set of nocturnal love songs—is the grandfather of the orchestral song cycle. Unlike his earlier and wilder Symphonie fantastique, it is consistently subtle and refined, sustaining a seductive nocturnal mood—though, like Symphonie fantastique, it is linked to the composer’s tumultuous love life. Strauss’s Eine Alpensinfonie, on the other hand, is a grandiose showpiece for a huge orchestra, the culmination of a tradition rather than the start of a new one. The composer’s final tone poem, it rivals the spectacular effects in Also sprach Zarathustra and Ein Heldenleben. In 22 vivid pieces of tone painting, the work depicts the exhilarating ascent and terrifying descent of a mountain climber through dark woods, sunny meadows, and a harrowing storm. Though written in two different centuries, both works are distinctly Romantic: Berlioz’s in its depiction of passion and longing, and Strauss’s in its extravagant lushness and grandeur.