Alan Gilbert Departs for First European Tour with New York Philharmonic: 13 Performances in Nine Cities

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Features Guest Soloists Yefim Bronfman and Thomas Hampson

After a string of highly-acclaimed performances in their home hall, the New York Philharmonic and its Music Director, Alan Gilbert, head out this week for their first European tour. EUROPE/WINTER 2010 comprises 13 performances in nine European cities: Barcelona, Zaragoza, and Madrid, all in Spain; Zurich, Switzerland; Frankfurt, Cologne, and Dortmund (the Orchestra’s debut there) in Germany; Paris, France; and London, England. Joining Gilbert and the orchestra on tour are soloists whose recent performances with them in New York were lavishly praised: pianist Yefim Bronfman, who will reprise Prokofiev’s devilishly difficult Piano Concerto No. 2, and baritone Thomas Hampson, the Philharmonic’s Mary and James G. Wallach Artist-in-Residence, who will once again sing John Adams’s heart-wrenching Whitman setting, The Wound-Dresser.

Also on the tour programs are the European premieres of Magnus Lindberg’s EXPO, commissioned by the New York Philharmonic for the opening this season of Gilbert’s tenure as Music Director, and Sibelius’s sweeping Symphony No. 2, a work Gilbert and the Philharmonic have never yet performed together. This tour marks the Philharmonic’s first return to Spain since 2001. The Orchestra last performed in Zurich, Switzerland, in 1985, in Cologne in 2007, and in Frankfurt, Paris, and London in 2008. This will be the Philharmonic’s debut in Dortmund.

Soon after, they return to New York where they will perform the world premiere of Christopher Rouse’s Odna Zhizn, a New York Philharmonic commission, on a program at Avery Fisher Hall also featuring two works by Mozart: his Sinfonia Concertante for Winds (with four soloists from the Orchestra: Liang Wang, Principal Oboe; Mark Nuccio, Acting Principal Clarinet; Judith LeClair, Principal Bassoon; and Philip Myers, Principal Horn) and “Jupiter” Symphony (Feb 10-12 & 16).

On Saturday, February 13, Gilbert and the orchestra return to New York’s Carnegie Hall for a single concert showcasing the U.S. premiere of Magnus Lindberg’s landmark Clarinet Concerto with soloist Kari Kriikku, for whom the work was written, alongside Wagner’s Rienzi Overture and Sibelius’s Symphony No. 2. Lindberg is the Philharmonic’s Marie-Josée Kravis Composer-in-Residence.

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