Event is Live
CARNEGIE HALL PRESENTS

Cancelled: San Francisco Symphony

Tuesday, March 17, 2020 8 PM Stern Auditorium / Perelman Stage
Michael Tilson Thomas conducts music for which he has had a long-standing affinity in the first of his two final New York City concerts as the San Francisco Symphony’s music director. Stravinsky’s spectacular The Firebird is a thrilling showpiece, while John Adams’s I Still Dance is an exuberant curtain raiser. Gautier Capuçon provides additional excitement as soloist in Saint-Saëns’s daredevil Cello Concerto No. 1.

San Francisco Symphony is also performing March 18.

Performers

San Francisco Symphony
Michael Tilson Thomas, Music Director and Conductor
Gautier Capuçon, Cello

Program

JOHN ADAMS I Still Dance (NY Premiere, co-commissioned by Carnegie Hall)

SAINT-SAËNS Cello Concerto No. 1

STRAVINSKY The Firebird

Event Duration

The printed program will last approximately two hours, including one 20-minute intermission.

Pre-Concert Talk

Pre-concert talk at 7 PM with Paul Berry, Adjunct Associate Professor of Music History, Yale University.
Mihuzo logo
This performance is sponsored by Mizuho Americas.
Support for the 125 Commissions Project is provided by members of Carnegie Hall's Composer Club.
In honor of the centenary of his birth, Carnegie Hall’s 2019–2020 season is dedicated to the memory of Isaac Stern in recognition of his extraordinary contributions to Carnegie Hall, arts advocacy, and the field of music.

At a Glance

JOHN ADAMS  I Still Dance

John Adams’s brief new piece, I Still Dance, was composed in honor of the 25th and final season of Michael Tilson Thomas’s tenure as the San Francisco Symphony’s music director. It celebrates “the continued youthful vitality” of Tilson Thomas, as well as of his husband, Joshua Robison. I Still Dance sustains an explosive, relentless intensity from the first downbeat through most of its span. Just as the churning maelstrom of energy seems poised to rouse for a climax, Adams dims the lights for what he describes as a “soft landing.”

 

SAINT-SAËNS  Cello Concerto No. 1 in A Minor, Op. 33

Saint-Saëns was not only an extraordinary composer, he was an accomplished organist, champion of forgotten early music and of contemporary composers, inspiring teacher, gifted writer, world traveler, and an informed aficionado of such disciplines as Classical languages, astronomy, archaeology, philosophy, and even the occult sciences. He gave cellists their most famous short piece, the noble and evocative “The Swan” from Le carnaval des animaux, and this, one of the most graceful of concertos. It is nicely punctual, it has pleasing tunes and a bang-up close, and—something particularly appreciated by cellists—it presents none of the problems of balance, of sheer audibility of the solo instrument, that are a bother in almost all other examples of the genre.

 

STRAVINSKY  The Firebird

The first performance of The Firebird by Serge Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes made Stravinsky a celebrity—for life. Its Parisian audience wanted a taste of the avant-garde, and with this ballet score the 27-year-old more than delivered. The company made a specialty of dancing works inspired by Russian folklore, and The Firebird was perfectly suited to Ballets Russes designs. The fantastical tale involves a dashing prince, an evil sorcerer, enchanted princesses, a magic egg, and, of course, the mythical and mystical titular creature.

Bios

San Francisco Symphony

The San Francisco Symphony (SFS) gave its first concerts in 1911 and has grown in acclaim under a succession of distinguished music directors: Henry Hadley, Alfred Hertz, Basil Cameron, ...

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Michael Tilson Thomas

Michael Tilson Thomas first conducted the San Francisco Symphony (SFS) in 1974 and has been music director since 1995. In what is widely considered one of the most dynamic and productive ...

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Gautier Capuçon

Gautier Capuçon regularly performs with many of the world’s foremost conductors and instrumentalists. He is also founder and leader of the Classe d’Excellence de ...

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