It was a big year for new music in Boston. At the center of it was an improbable figure, a 100-year-old composer of bracing modern music named Elliott Carter, but there were many other events that showed just how much life was pulsing from this niche within a niche.
Living for a century is still a milestone; for a great and still-productive artist to do so is virtually unheard of. So there's a special satisfaction in celebrating this latest of Elliott Carter's achievements. And since this last year was already Carter's hundredth, in anticipation of his actual birthday on December 11, festivities have abounded all year long. Last summer's Festival of Contemporary Music at Tanglewood was devoted entirely to Carter: nine concerts over five days, nearly 50 works, two world premieres among them, performed by admired stars, young artists on the rise, and gifted students, with Carter very much in attendance.
Concertgoers last week lost a rare opportunity to hear the Boston Symphony Orchestra play under the baton of a legendary Russian conductor in the twilight of his career. Gennady Rozhdestvensky was scheduled to conduct the BSO, but he angrily pulled out of all four performances at the last minute and left town.
On July 3 of next year, Maestro James Levine of the Boston Symphony Orchestra will be opening the Tanglewood Festival with a program made entirely of Tchaikovsky works: Symphony No. 6, Pathétique, and the Piano Concerto No. 1. Pianist Yefim Bronfman will be featured during this opening performance. Levine and the BSO will be bringing Mahler and Brahms pieces performed this fall back for an encore during the summer season. He will also be working with the students of the Tanglewood Music Center, who will perform Wagner's Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Act III along with the Tanglewood Festival Chorus.
Other highlights of next year's festival include "James Taylor and Friends," an extra week added to the Tanglewood season for master classes, workshops and concerts by James Taylor and select musicians. This segment will end with a Taylor-BSO collaboration concert featuring John Williams conducting. Read more »
