Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symhony, Winners of 3 Grammys at the 52nd Annual Grammy Awards, to make 5-city US Tour in March

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Tour Includes Two Carnegie Hall Concerts, Which Mark Orchestra’s 25th Visit to the Hall

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Michael Tilson Thomas (MTT) and the San Francisco Symphony (SFS) will make a five-city U.S. tour from March 18 to 26 with performances in Champaign-Urbana, IL (March 18); Ann Arbor, MI (March 19 and 20); Philadelphia (March 23); Washington, D.C. (March 24); and in New York at Carnegie Hall (March 25 and 26). The March 25 and 26 concerts mark the Orchestra’s 25th engagement at Carnegie Hall since its first appearance there in 1947.

The tour repertoire features violinist Christian Tetzlaff performing Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto and soprano Laura Claycomb and mezzo-soprano Katarina Karnéus in Mahler’s Symphony No. 2, Resurrection. Symphony No. 2 has been recorded by the San Francisco Symphony as part of its Mahler Project, which to date has won seven Grammy Awards, including three Grammys for Mahler Symphony No. 8 and the Adagio from Symphony No. 10 at the most recent Grammy Awards on January 31. The tour also includes a new work commissioned by the San Francisco Symphony, Post-scriptum by Russian composer Victor Kissine, which is dedicated to MTT and the SFS, as well as Ravel’s Valses nobles et sentimentales and Liszt’s Tasso: Lament and Triumph. The Symphony will perform the world premiere of Victor Kissine’s Post-scriptum March 4 in San Francisco , which is dedicated to MTT and the SFS.

Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony open their 2010 U.S. tour at the Krannert Center on the campus of the University of Illinois on Tuesday, March 18 followed by a two-day visit to the University of Michigan , with performances at Hill Auditorium on March 19 and 20. In Ann Arbor, MTT and musicians of the Orchestra will hold master classes with University students and host a series of educational events including a teacher workshop, symposium, and a screening of its Keeping Score PBS series for students. At the March 20 concert, MTT and the SFS will receive the University Music Society’s Distinguished Artist Award, in recognition of the SFS’ long standing relationship with the University of Michigan ’s music school. It is the first time in the history of the award that it is being presented to an orchestra. At the March 18 Champaign-Urbana concert, the Orchestra performs Victor Kissine’s Post-scriptum, Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto with Christian Tetzlaff, Liszt‘s Tasso: Lament and Triumph and Ravel’s Valses nobles et sentimentales. The Orchestra will repeat this program at Hill Auditorium on March 19, and on March 20 they will perform Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 with Laura Claycomb, Katarina Karnéus, and the University Musical Society Choral Union.

At the Kimmel Center in Philadelphia on Tuesday, March 23, the Orchestra will be joined by the Westminster Symphonic Choir in Mahler’s Symphony No. 2, and on March 24 at the Kennedy Center in Washington , D.C. , MTT and the Orchestra will perform the program of works by Kissine, Tchaikovsky, Liszt, and Ravel.

MTT and the San Francisco Symphony return to New York ’s Carnegie Hall on Thursday and Friday, March 25 and 26, with concerts of both tour programs. The Westminster Symphonic Choir will again join the Orchestra on March 26 in Mahler’s Symphony No. 2.

This season Michael Tilson Thomas celebrates his 15th season as Music Director of the San Francisco Symphony. In 1996, MTT led the orchestra on the first of their 22 national and international tours together to Europe, Asia and throughout the United States , with annual performances at Carnegie Hall. Last season they opened Carnegie Hall’s 2008-09 season with a gala tribute to Leonard Bernstein, which was filmed and broadcast nationally on Thirteen/WNET New York’s Great Performances on PBS. Other tour highlights have included their third West Coast tour with MTT in January 2009, including their first concerts in Seattle since 1981; their first appearances in mainland China as part of their 2006 Asia tour; a three-week 2007 European tour that featured two televised appearances at the BBC Proms in London and concerts in such European music capitals as Dublin, Vienna, Paris, and Belgium; and at several major European festivals, including Lucerne.

Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony maintain a leading presence among American orchestras through over 230 concerts at home and abroad, an active touring program, award-winning recordings, and innovative broadcast and education projects. Their commitment to music education has resulted in the groundbreaking television, radio and multimedia project Keeping Score; a nationally syndicated radio series on avant-garde American composers, American Mavericks; an award-winning children’s website, www.sfskids.com; and Adventures in Music, a nationally acclaimed in-school music education program in San Francisco schools. The Keeping Score series has been viewed by over six million Americans since its first broadcast in September 2006 and acclaimed for making classical music accessible to a wider, more diverse audience. This year, Tilson Thomas and the SFS conclude an ambitious self-produced Mahler recording project, launched in 2001. To date, the Orchestra’s Mahler cycle on SFS Media has been recognized with seven Grammy Awards, winning three 2009 Grammy Awards on for its recording of Mahler’s Symphony No. 8 and the Adagio from Symphony No. .10..

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