Alan Gilbert Leads NY Philharmonic on CALIFORNIA 2016 Tour This Week

Music Director Alan Gilbert will lead the New York Philharmonic on the CALIFORNIA 2016 tour, this week, May 3-7, 2016. The tour will feature four orchestral concerts with appearances in Costa Mesa, San Diego, and San Francisco. Principal Cello Carter Brey will perform as soloist in Schumann's Cello Concerto. It will be the Philharmonic's ninth tour, and the second to California, under Alan Gilbert's leadership. CALIFORNIA 2016 marks the New York Philharmonic's thirteenth concert tour under the aegis of Credit Suisse.

"I look forward to showcasing this Orchestra's brilliance in cornerstones of the repertoire on our travels to Costa Mesa, San Diego, and San Francisco," said Music Director Alan Gilbert. "One program spotlights our magnificent Principal Cello Carter Brey in the Schumann concerto coupled with music by Brahms. The other program pairs works by Beethoven with two masterpieces by Sibelius, extending our musical celebration of Sibelius's 150th birthday to California. I feel a strong affinity to Nordic composers, and I believe that Sibelius is one of the great 20th-century symphonists and that his music says something very true about all of humanity."

"A key component of our mission is to represent our city around the world through extraordinary performances and connections with audiences for whom a New York Philharmonic concert is a rare event," said New York Philharmonic President Matthew VanBesien. "This is especially true when we visit cities across our own country, and I look forward to experiencing the audience's reception of Alan Gilbert and the Orchestra's performances of this great repertoire. Our national and international endeavors are only possible through the generosity of our Exclusive Tour Sponsor, Credit Suisse, which understands how important it is for New York's orchestra to also be America's foremost touring orchestra."

Tour Itinerary and Repertoire

The first program of the CALIFORNIA 2016 tour features Schumann's Cello Concerto, with Principal Cello Carter Brey as soloist, and two works by Schumann's prote?ge?, Brahms: the Tragic Overture and Symphony No. 2. This program opens the tour in Costa Mesa, where the Philharmonic is being presented by the Philharmonic Society of Orange County at the Rene?e and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall, Segerstrom Center for the Arts, on May 3, and will also be performed in the concluding concert of the tour, in San Francisco at Louise M. Davies Symphony Hall on May 7, the last of two concerts presented by the San Francisco Symphony as part of its Great Performers Series.

The second program continues the Philharmonic's season-long celebration of the 150th anniversary of Sibelius's birth with two of his masterworks: the Symphony No. 7 and Finlandia. The program also features Beethoven's Egmont Overture and Symphony No. 7. Alan Gilbert's focus on Sibelius's works follows the completion, in the 2014-15 season, of The Nielsen Project, the initiative he began in his first season as Music Director to perform and record the Danish composer's complete symphonies and concertos. "Sibelius was as much a part of my life when I was chief conductor and artistic advisor of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra as was Nielsen, whose symphonies and concertos the Philharmonic and I have explored over many seasons, so the time is right for us to turn to this great Finnish composer," said Alan Gilbert. "Sibelius's Seventh Symphony is an amazing piece, in part because of its enigmatic ending - it is difficult to decide whether it is happy or sad, a dilemma that is so true of life." The program will be performed in San Diego, where the Philharmonic is being presented by the La Jolla Music Society at Jacobs Music Center-Copley Symphony Hall on May 4, and in San Francisco at Louise M. Davies Symphony Hall on May 6, the first of two concerts presented by the San Francisco Symphony as part of its Great Performers Series. A complete schedule of CALIFORNIA 2016 performances appears at the end of this press release.

Performance History

The New York Philharmonic last appeared in Costa Mesa, San Diego, and San Francisco in May 2012 on the CALIFORNIA 2012 tour, which included two performances as part of the American Orchestra Series of the San Francisco Symphony's 2011-12 Centennial season.

The Philharmonic made its debut in Costa Mesa in 1999 and returned for subsequent performances in 2006 and 2012; it debuted in San Diego in 1921 and returned four times; and it debuted in San Francisco in 1921 and returned in eight subsequent years.

The Orchestra most recently appeared in California in August 2015 in its sold-out debut at the Santa Barbara Bowl as part of the Philharmonic's inaugural performance residency at the Music Academy of the West - the first American partner in the New York Philharmonic Global Academy, collaborations with partners worldwide offering training of pre-professional musicians, often alongside performance residencies.

Artists

Music Director Alan Gilbert began his New York Philharmonic tenure in 2009, the first native New Yorker in the post. He and the Philharmonic have introduced the positions of The Marie- Jose?e Kravis Composer-in-Residence, The Mary and James G. Wallach Artist-in-Residence, and Artist-in-Association; CONTACT!, the new-music series; NY PHIL BIENNIAL, an exploration of today's music; and New York Philharmonic Global Academy, collaborations with partners worldwide offering training of pre-professional musicians, often alongside performance residencies. As The New Yorker wrote, "Gilbert has made an indelible mark on the orchestra's history and that of the city itself."

Alan Gilbert's 2015-16 Philharmonic highlights include R. Strauss's Ein Heldenleben to welcome Concertmaster Frank Huang; Carnegie Hall's Opening Night Gala; and five World Premieres. He co-curates and conducts in the second NY PHIL BIENNIAL and performs violin in Messiaen's Quartet for the End of Time. He leads the Orchestra as part of the Shanghai Orchestra Academy and Residency Partnership and appears at Santa Barbara's Music Academy of the West. Philharmonic-tenure highlights include acclaimed stagings of Ligeti's Le Grand Macabre, Jana?c?ek's The Cunning Little Vixen, Stephen Sondheim's Sweeney Todd starring Bryn Terfel and Emma Thompson (for which Mr. Gilbert was nominated for a 2015 Emmy Award for Outstanding Music Direction), and Honegger's Joan of Arc at the Stake starring Marion Cotillard; 24 World Premieres; The Nielsen Project, a performance and recording cycle; Verdi Requiem and Bach's B-minor Mass; the score from 2001: A Space Odyssey alongside the film; Mahler's Resurrection Symphony on the tenth anniversary of 9/11; and nine tours around the world. In August 2015 he led the Mahler Chamber Orchestra in the U.S. Stage Premiere of George Benjamin's Written on Skin, co-presented as part of the Lincoln Center-New York Philharmonic Opera Initiative.

Conductor laureate of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra and principal guest conductor of Hamburg's NDR Symphony Orchestra, Alan Gilbert regularly conducts leading orchestras around the world. This season Mr. Gilbert makes debuts with four great European orchestras - Filarmonica della Scala, Dresden Staatskapelle, London Symphony, and Academy of St. Martin in the Fields - and returns to The Cleveland Orchestra and Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra. He made his acclaimed Metropolitan Opera debut conducting John Adams's Doctor Atomic in 2008, the DVD of which received a Grammy Award. Rene?e Fleming's recent Decca recording Poe?mes, on which he conducted, received a 2013 Grammy Award. His recordings have received top honors from the Chicago Tribune and Gramophone magazine. Mr. Gilbert is Director of Conducting and Orchestral Studies at The Juilliard School, where he holds the William Schuman Chair in Musical Studies. His honors include an Honorary Doctor of Music degree from The Curtis Institute of Music (2010), Columbia University's Ditson Conductor's Award for his "exceptional commitment to the performance of works by American composers and to contemporary music" (2011), election to The American Academy of Arts & Sciences (2014), and a Foreign Policy Association Medal for his commitment to cultural diplomacy (2015).

Carter Brey was appointed Principal Cello, The Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Chair, of the New York Philharmonic in 1996. He made his official subscription debut with the Orchestra in May 1997 performing Tchaikovsky's Rococo Variations under the direction of then Music Director Kurt Masur. He has since appeared as soloist each season, and was featured during The Bach Variations: A Philharmonic Festival, when he gave two performances of the cycle of all six of Bach's cello suites. He rose to international attention in 1981 as a prizewinner in the Rostropovich International Cello Competition. The winner of the Gregor Piatigorsky Memorial Prize, Avery Fisher Career Grant, Young Concert Artists' Michaels Award, and other honors, he also was the first musician to win the Arts Council of America's Performing Arts Prize. Mr. Brey has appeared as soloist with virtually all the major orchestras in the United States, and performed under the batons of prominent conductors including Claudio Abbado, Semyon Bychkov, Sergiu Comissiona, and Christoph von Dohna?nyi. He has made regular appearances with the Tokyo and Emerson string quartets as well as The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and at festivals such as Spoleto (both in the United States and Italy), and the Santa Fe and La Jolla Chamber Music festivals. He presents an ongoing series of duo recitals with pianist Christopher O'Riley; together they have recorded Le Grand Tango: Music of Latin America, a disc of compositions from South America and Mexico released on Helicon Records. Mr. Brey was educated at the Peabody Institute, where he studied with Laurence Lesser and Stephen Kates, and at Yale University, where he studied with Aldo Parisot and was a Wardwell Fellow and a Houpt Scholar. His violoncello is a rare J.B. Guadagnini made in Milan in 1754. Carter Brey's most recent solo appearance with the Philharmonic was in September 2013, when he performed Penderecki's Concerto grosso alongside cellists Alisa Weilerstein and Daniel Mu?ller-Schott, led by Charles Dutoit. He also performs Schumann's Cello Concerto with the New York Philharmonic, led by Alan Gilbert, at its New York home in April 2016.

The New York Philharmonic plays a leading cultural role in New York City, the United States, and the world. This season's projects will connect the Philharmonic with up to 50 million music lovers through live concerts in New York City and on its worldwide tours and residencies; digital recording series; international broadcasts on television, radio, and online; and as a resource through its wide range of education programs and Digital Archives. The Orchestra has commissioned and/or premiered works by leading composers from every era since its founding in 1842 - including Dvor?a?k's New World Symphony, John Adams's Pulitzer Prize-winning On the Transmigration of Souls, dedicated to the victims of 9/11, and Magnus Lindberg's Piano Concerto No. 2. Renowned around the globe, the Philharmonic has appeared in 432 cities in 63 countries - including the groundbreaking 1930 tour of Europe; the unprecedented 1959 tour to the USSR; the historic 2008 visit to Pyongyang, D.P.R.K., the first there by an American orchestra; and the Orchestra's debut in Hanoi, Vietnam, in 2009. The New York Philharmonic serves as a resource for its community and the world. It complements its annual free concerts across the city - including the Concerts in the Parks, Presented by Didi and Oscar Schafer - with Philharmonic Free Fridays and a wide range of education programs - among them the famed, long-running Young People's Concerts and Philharmonic Schools, an immersive classroom program that reaches thousands of New York City students. Committed to developing tomorrow's leading orchestral musicians, the Philharmonic has established the New York Philharmonic Global Academy, collaborations with partners worldwide offering training of pre- professional musicians, often alongside performance residencies. These include the Shanghai Orchestra Academy and Residency Partnership and collaborations with Santa Barbara's Music Academy of the West and The Shepherd School of Music at Rice University. The oldest American symphony orchestra and one of the oldest in the world, the New York Philharmonic has made almost 2,000 recordings since 1917, including several Grammy Award winners, and its self-produced digital recording series continues in the 2015-16 season. Music Director Alan Gilbert began his tenure in September 2009, succeeding a distinguished line of 20th-century musical giants that includes Leonard Bernstein, Arturo Toscanini, and Gustav Mahler.

Pictured: Alan Gilbert and the New York Philharmonic in Costa Mesa at the Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall, Segerstrom Center for the Arts, in 2012. Photo by Chris Lee.