Carnegie Hall

Widely recognized as one of the world’s finest orchestras, the Boston Symphony Orchestra (BSO) performs in its renowned Symphony Hall and at Tanglewood, its lush summer home in the Berkshires. But Carnegie Hall has often served as the orchestra’s home away from home. Since its founding in 1881, the ensemble has performed at the hall 956 times—the most of any visiting orchestra. The orchestra’s unique sound, ambitious repertoire, and community-oriented presence are at the core of its identity and can be traced back to its earliest days.

An International Influence

Henry Lee Higginson, an American businessman and Civil War veteran, founded the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 1881. “The scheme, half-baked, no doubt, was simply this,” Higginson wrote: “to give concerts of good music, very well performed, in such style as we had all heard for years in Europe; to make fair prices for the tickets and then open wide the doors.”

The European model was central to Higginson’s conception of the BSO and was an enduring theme throughout the orchestra’s early years. Higginson hired the German-born baritone and composer Georg (later Sir George) Henschel to conduct his new ensemble after watching him in a single performance with the Harvard Musical Association. Henschel even debuted an orchestral layout with divided first and second violins, approved by his friend Johannes Brahms.

After Henschel’s departure three years later, Higginson picked one European conductor after another. Between 1893 and 1898, Hungarian-born Arthur Nikisch frequently programmed Brahms—new music that audiences didn’t always appreciate. Wilhelm Gericke, another Austrian maestro, brought the group to its current home, Symphony Hall, in 1900.

During his tenure between 1919 and 1924, Pierre Monteux—known as the “valiant Frenchman”—kept the group alive through a strike and shifted the orchestra’s focus toward the French repertoire that has become a major part of its legacy. Monteux also introduced Carnegie Hall audiences to Stravinsky’s seismic ballet The Rite of Spring in 1924. But the ensemble truly hit its stride under Russian-born Serge Koussevitzky, the organization’s conductor (then music director) from 1924 to 1949, who enriched the BSO’s repertoire with new commissions and a focus on American composers. Japanese conductor Seiji Ozawa’s unprecedented 29-year tenure with the BSO began in 1973.The group’s 15th and current music director, Andris Nelsons—who made his debut with the BSO at Carnegie Hall in March 2011—hails from Riga, Latvia.

A Carnegie Hall Connection

The BSO’s Carnegie Hall connection dates back to the ensemble’s earliest days. In fact, the orchestra made its Carnegie Hall debut even before it had moved into its current home in Symphony Hall. In his first BSO season, Austrian Emil Paur (BSO conductor 1893–1898) kicked off the orchestra’s November 8, 1893, concert with Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony and finished with an overture by Berlioz. 

The orchestra has continued to grace the Carnegie Hall stage for the past 13 decades. Several preeminent musicians—including Sergei Rachmaninoff (in 1909) and Aaron Copland (in 1927)—made their Carnegie Hall debuts with the orchestra. Others, like Sergei Prokofiev, chose the BSO as their primary orchestral collaborator; he performed six times with the orchestra between 1926 and 1933, including the New York premieres of his Second and Fifth piano concertos. Koussevitzky (who led the orchestra 250 times at Carnegie Hall) commissioned Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra, and premiered the work at the Hall in 1945 with the composer in attendance. Current BSO Music Director Andris Nelsons made his debut with the orchestra at Carnegie Hall leading Mahler’s Ninth Symphony on March 17, 2011.

In all, the Boston Symphony Orchestra has premiered more than 300 works at Carnegie Hall, including Copland’s Preamble for a Solemn Occasion—as part of the venue’s first televised concert. Several of these works have also been New York premieres, including, but not limited to Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring and Symphony of Psalms; Richard Strauss’s Don Quixote; Mahler’s Fifth and Ninth symphonies; and Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloé Suite No. 2, Le tombeau de Couperin, and Piano Concerto for the Left Hand.

A Resplendent Summer Home

The Boston Symphony Orchestra gave its first summer performance in the Berkshires in 1936—and left an impression. Months later, Mrs. Gorham Brooks and Miss Aspinwall Tappan offered the 210-acre Tappan family estate in Lenox, Massachusetts, to Koussevitzky and the orchestra. The BSO first played under a large tent, but upgraded to a playfully named “Shed” two years later. 

With later updates, including an expanded property and an upgraded concert hall, Tanglewood has become the most famous summer home of any American orchestra. Featuring more than two months of performances that include the BSO’s eight-week residency, the venue is known to host popular music artists, plenty of pops-themed concerts, hundreds of students as part of the BSO’s summer academy, and more, drawing more than 350,000 visitors each year.

A Focus on Education

Tanglewood is not just a home for the BSO, but also a revered training ground for young musicians. Koussevitzky founded the Berkshire Music Center (now Tanglewood Music Center) in 1940, bringing together renowned instructors under Aaron Copland’s for vocal, conducting, instrumental, and compositional instruction.

The program continues to this day, hosting some of the world’s best young artists. According to a recent BSO study, nearly a quarter of all first-chair orchestra players of major American orchestras had participated in the festival.

The BSO also partners locally with the Boston Youth Symphony Orchestras, a nonprofit organization with six ensembles and other training resources for kids. The BSO has performed joint concerts with the group’s youth ensembles in recent years directed toward young children.

A Popular Flair

Consistent with Higginson’s wish to provide some lighter fare to concertgoers, the BSO began offering performances of popular tunes and fan-favorite orchestral selections in 1885. By 1900, the concerts took on their modern name: Pops.

In the more than 100 years since, the Boston Pops Orchestra—primarily composed of BSO members—has become the standard-bearer for ensembles of its type. The orchestra puts on dozens of packed performances each year, including the ever-popular Holiday Pops concert series and a live-broadcast Fourth of July performance on the Charles River. The Pops has been led by such legendary figures as Arthur Fiedler and John Williams. Keith Lockhart is in the third decade of his dynamic tenure.

In hosting the Boston Symphony Orchestra for well over a century, Carnegie Hall has seen more iterations of the orchestra than any other venue—including the ensemble’s homes at Symphony Hall and Tanglewood. It has witnessed the orchestra’s upstart 19th-century days, its ascendance under the baton of Koussevitzky, and its long-maintained presence as one of the world’s finest ensembles. When the BSO comes to town, it brings its best to Carnegie Hall—historic debuts, dazzling concertos, and fresh interpretations of classics. It’s a collaboration that endures, a host and guest in harmony.

Photography: Boston Symphony Orchestra by Chris Lee, Nelsons by Jennifer Taylor. All other images courtesy of the Carnegie Hall Rose Archives