Brahms und Berliner

The innocence, joy, and romance of the Brahms Second Symphony still resonate with us in the 21st century. As part of the Berliner Philharmoniker's joint Brahms-Schoenberg exploration, it's joined on their November 12 program by two electrifying works that could only have been written in the modern era. Schoenberg's Chamber Symphony resembles a miniature Mahler symphony, and in Erwartung, an opera for a single singer, Schoenberg said he tried “to represent in slow motion everything that occurs in a single second of maximum spiritual excitement.” Read more »

The Berliner Philharmoniker perform an excerpt from Brahms's Second Symphony. Watch the complete video at the Berliner Philharmoniker's Digital Concert Hall. Used courtesy of the Berliner Philharmoniker.

Related events: November 12, 2009 Berliner Philarmoniker

Soundbyte: Luca Pisaroni

Bass-baritone Luca Pisaroni makes some surprising repertoire choices for his Carnegie Hall recital debut on November 13, including songs by Schubert, Rossini, Meyerbeer, and Liszt. Jeremy Geffen, Carnegie Hall's Director of Artistic Planning, tells us how rare it is to hear a recital that includes this particular collection of composers, especially with a singer who is so completely committed to the repertoire.

Related events: November 13, 2009 Luca Pisaroni / Vlad Iftinca

Soundbyte: Shanghai Symphony Orchestra

The Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, founded in 1879, is the oldest orchestra in China. Because of colonial influences in Shanghai at the turn of the 20th century, much of the standard Western orchestral literature was first performed in China by the Shanghai Symphony. Jeremy Geffen, Carnegie Hall’s Director of Artistic Planning, describes the influence that Music Director Long Yu has had on the ensemble and why it’s important for New York audiences to hear what Chinese orchestral musicianship sounds like.

Related events: November 10, 2009 Shanghai Symphony Orchestra

Sneak peek: Milton Nascimento

“Beyond jazz, beyond pop, in its own special orbit, lies the Nascimento sound.” To that sentence, written 25 years ago by Mark Ginsburg for Milton’s Carnegie Hall debut, the same writer now adds, “beyond time.” On the list of intoxicating Brazilian musical forms (including bossa nova, Tropicália, Brazilian popular music, and samba), and the extraordinary musicians who helped create them (such as Tom Jobim, Vinicius de Moraes, João Gilberto, Gilberto Gil, Caetano Veloso, Chico Buarque, and Elis Regina), there’s one famous name that stands alone: Milton Nascimento. Read more »

Milton Nascimento performing an excerpt from "Cravo e Canela"
From the album Lo Borges Clube Da Esquina
Blue Note Records

Related events: November 18, 2009 Milton Nascimento

The return of Alfred Brendel

Considered one of the world’s most thoughtful interpreters of Classical and Romantic piano literature, pianist Alfred Brendel returns to New York for the first time since retiring from public performance in 2008.

On Thursday, November 19, he begins a four-day residency, lecturing on performance practice, interpretation, and process, at The Juilliard School. On Sunday, November 22, a free concert features young artists from Juilliard and The Academy, who perform vocal, chamber, and solo music of Schubert, in a concert programmed and coached by Mr. Brendel.

Related events: November 19, 2009 Alfred Brendel Lecture: Light and Shade of Interpretation; November 22, 2009 Alfred Brendel on Schubert

Sneak peek: Sara Tavares

On her albums, Cape Verdean singer-guitarist-composer, Sara Tavares, is enticing, to say the least. But live, she’s irresistible. “Her voice can caress phrases with the breathy ease of a Brazilian pop singer or take on a sharper African edge,” says the New York Times. Local audiences will get a chance to hear for themselves on November 13, when the songstress performs at Carnegie Hall. Read more about Cape Verdean music »

Excerpt from Sara Tavares's "Balancê".
World Music International

Related events: November 13, 2009 Sara Tavares

In the artist's own words: Chen Shi-Zheng

A Chinese Home receives its world premiere at Carnegie Hall on November 3, with Kronos Quartet and Wu Man. Conceived by David Harrington, Wu Man, and Chen Shi-Zheng, the director and visual designer. Chen Shi-Zheng discusses his vision for the work:

When I came into this project at the beginning, David and Wu Man had already talked a lot about the music that would make up A Chinese Home. We spent a week going through all the music together, making selections, and trying to make sense of the story behind it all. I realized in this process that the music that David and Wu Man collected and liked was really about China in the 20th century. David was fascinated by the revolutionary music and 1930s Shanghai music, as well as traditional music, so I thought that we could create a suite, putting all the music together in chronological order in four parts. We start at the beginning of the 20th century—timeless, traditional China—then move to urban China of the 1920s and ’30s. Then we enter the era of Mao and the emergence of Red China, and end with modern China.

An exclusive look at A Chinese Home

View a behind-the-scenes look at a rehearsal for A Chinese Home. The piece, conceived by Wu Man, David Harrington, and Chen Shi-Zheng, receives its world premiere at Carnegie Hall on November 3.

Click to view a slide show »

Related events: November 3, 2009 Kronos Quartet / Wu Man

In the artist's own words: David Harrington

David Harrington, founder and artistic director of Kronos Quartet, describes the genesis of A Chinese Home, which receives its world premiere on November 3:

In 1992, I visited the home of composers Zhou Long and Chen Yi in New York. They shared a lot of music with me that evening, including the brilliant artistry of Wu Man, who had recently arrived in the United States. I heard all sorts of possibilities in Wu Man’s vivid pipa sound, and I got in touch with her immediately.

Sneak peek: The Miraculous Mandarin

Bartók was strongly attracted to the dramatic and horrifying tale of The Miraculous Mandarin, with its underlying message about the power of human love. As The Miraculous Mandarin begins, a girl is forced by three thugs to stand in a window, luring men inside to be robbed. Her first two victims, an old rake and a shy young man, are penniless; the third, the eerie but wealthy mandarin, presents a horrifying challenge. The girl finds him repulsive, but she slowly begins her dance of seduction. Read more »

Gerard McBurney discusses the political and social background of Bartók’s The Miraculous Mandarin.

Related events: November 4, 2009 Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra

In the artist's own words: Wu Man

A Chinese Home receives its world premiere at Carnegie Hall on November 3, with a performance by Kronos Quartet and Wu Man. The piece was inspired by the extraordinary story of a 300-year-old house from a southeastern Chinese village that was dismantled piece-by-piece at the turn of the millennium and rebuilt at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts.

Wu Man describes her first time visiting the house:

I visited Yin Yu Tang at the Peabody Essex Museum for the first time in 2003. This house—an 18th-century home from southeastern China that was disassembled and re-erected piece-by-piece at PEM in Massachusetts—brought back many memories for me. I stayed in the home for quite a long while; I looked through each room, touching tables, chairs, and beds, taking in every little detail. It reminded me of my grandma's home and my childhood life. I didn't want to leave until the staff came to get me!

Perspectives: Kronos Quartet

Described as “an all-terrain vehicle in contemporary culture” (New Yorker), the Kronos Quartet has commissioned 650 new works for quartet since its inception more than 35 years ago.

The Kronos Quartet’s five Carnegie Hall Perspectives concerts feature music from minimalist original Terry Riley, works by composers from the Arctic Circle, performances on Angolan toy instruments, collaborations with virtuosic musicians from different traditions, and contemporary Chinese works. The Kronos Quartet will also lead a Professional Training Workshop, presented by The Weill Music Institute at Carnegie Hall.

Related events: November 3, 2009 A Chinese Home; March 11, 2010 Kronos Celebrates Terry Riley; March 12, 2010 Playing with Toys & Technology; March 13, 2010 Tundra Songs; March 14, 2010 Music Without Borders; March 17, 2010 Kronos Quartet Master Class; March 21, 2010 Kronos Quartet Young Artists Concert

Playing with water

On November 4, Colin Currie peforms on a dazzling array of water percussion instruments in Tan Dun’s Water Concerto, a concerto of thrilling sights and intoxicating sounds. One thing is for sure: Things are going to get a little wet.

Watch a behind-the-scenes video of Colin Currie preparing for Tan Dun’s Water Concerto »

Related events: November 4, 2009 Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra

You won't find this young composer out of "commissions"

Composer Angel Lam often bases her music on her own short stories—so much so, that she even plays narrator for the NY premiere of her most recent Carnegie Hall–commissioned work, Awakening from a Disappearing Garden, that features soloist Yo-Yo Ma and the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra on November 7. This is not the first commission that the young Chinese-born composer has premiered at Carnegie Hall. She previously participated in two Professional Training Workshops presented by Carnegie Hall's Weill Music Institute, resulting in two works: Empty Mountain, Spirit Rain (for Yo-Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble, which has recorded the work twice) and Sun, Moon, and Star (for a workshop led by Osvaldo Golijov and Dawn Upshaw).

Angel Lam's Empty Mountain, Spirit Rain
Recorded live at Ozawa Hall, Tanglewood Music Center

Related events: November 7, 2009 Atlanta Symphony Orchestra

Sneak peek: Iris Dévoilée

Iris dévoilée, which will be performed on November 10, is a musical portrait—not of a particular woman, but of woman in a universal sense, as a female archetype. Iris is Goethe’s ewig-Weibliche, the eternal feminine, and the unveiling referred to in the composition’s title is tantamount to her being discovered or revealed. The nine movements of Iris dévoilée, as Chen Qigang explains, portray nine aspects, nine frames of mind, nine facets of the same woman—changeable, elusive. They form a mosaic of impressions and tempers, appearances and natures that aims to express her unfathomable richness. Read more »


Excerpt from Chen Qigang's Iris dévoilée
Orchestre National de France
Virgin Records



Related events: November 10, 2009 Shanghai Symphony Orchestra

David Robertson creates possibilities

“Whether conducting music that is seldom played or music that is played too often for its own good,” said the New York Times of David Robertson’s compelling musical approach, “[he] makes everything seem fresh and startling.” Here, Robertson gives the inside scoop on how he creates such critically hailed programs.




Related events: November 4, 2009 Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra

Sneak peek: The Nightingale

“The forest, with its nightingale, the pure soul of the child who falls in love with its song … the baroque luxury of the Chinese Court, with its bizarre etiquette, its palace fêtes, its thousands of little bells and lanterns, and the grotesque humming of the mechanical Japanese nightingale."—Igor Stravinsky

Igor Stravinsky’s opera The Nightingale, which receives its first complete performance at Carnegie Hall on November 7, is based on a fairytale by Hans Christian Andersen. Stravinsky was in the final years of study with his mentor, Russian composer Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov when he went to work on it. Read more »

Excerpt from Stravinsky's The Nightingale
Reri Grist, soprano / Chorus and Orchestra of the Opera Sociey of Washington D.C. / Igor Stravinsky, conductor
Sony Classical

Related events: November 7, 2009 Atlanta Symphony Orchestra

Lang Lang gets by with a little help from his friends

China has already changed classical music’s global demographics. The sheer size of the country, however, is bound to change the game altogether. Inspired by a growing number of international figures like Tan Dun and Lang Lang, China’s 80 million music students have set out to conquer the world. Read more »


Lang Lang on the role of Chinese musicians today

Related events: October 27, 2009 Lang Lang and Friends