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  • AMERICAN CONDUCTOR ALAN GILBERT LEADS LOS ANGELES PHILHARMONIC IN A PROGRAM OF STRAUSS AND MOZART AT WALT DISNEY CONCERT HALL
  • Oct. 27, 2006
  • Emanuel Ax Performs Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 9

    FRIDAY, OCTOBER 27, 2006, AT 11 AM

    SATURDAY, OCTOBER 28, 2006, AT 8 PM

    SUNDAY, OCTOBER 29, 2006 AT 2 PM

    Emanuel Ax returns to Walt Disney Concert Hall to perform Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 9, K.271, as conductor Alan Gilbert leads the Los Angeles Philharmonic on Friday, October 27, 2006, at 11 a.m., on Saturday, October 28, at 8 p.m., and on Sunday, October 29, at 2 p.m. at Walt Disney Concert Hall. The program also includes Mozart's Don Giovanni Overture, and Strauss' Serenade and Der Rosenkavalier Suite.

    Acclaimed for his poetic lyricism and brilliant technique, pianist Emanuel Ax is one of today's best known and most highly regarded musicians. He is an On Location artist with the Los Angeles Philharmonic this season, and he performs in a series of chamber and orchestral programs centered on Mozart and Strauss works.

    Alan Gilbert, Chief Conductor and Artistic Advisor of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra since January 2000, is acclaimed for the breadth of his programming choices and has been widely praised for his performances of both standard and contemporary repertoire. He has also quickly developed a reputation as an opera conductor of distinction, beginning his tenure as the first Music Director in the Santa Fe Opera's history in October 2003.

    Upbeat Live pre-concert events take place in BP Hall one hour prior to the Saturday and Sunday concerts, and are free to all ticket holders. The Friday Upbeat Live is presented onstage in the auditorium and begins at 9:45 a.m. Lucinda Carver, pianist and conductor, is speaker.

    Conductor ALAN GILBERT was born in New York and began playing violin as a child. His parents, both violinists in the New York Philharmonic, were his first teachers. He studied at Harvard, the Curtis Institute, and the Juilliard School and has won numerous awards, including the prestigious Seaver / National Endowment for the Arts Conductors Award in 1997. He returned this summer to conduct the Santa Fe Opera in two new productions including the U.S. premiere of Thomas Adès' The Tempest, and a special gala celebrating the Santa Fe Opera's 50th anniversary season. In October 2005 he brought the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra to America for its first performances at New York's Carnegie Hall in more than two decades. He made his debut with the Deutsche Symphonie Orchester Berlin in January 2006. In spring of 2006, Gilbert returned to the Zurich Opera House to conduct Puccini's Turandot. The New York Philharmonic announced that Gilbert has been chosen by Music Director Lorin Maazel to conduct two weeks each season from 2006/07 through 2008/09. Gilbert will also return to conduct the Chicago Symphony Orchestra regularly in coming seasons. In addition to his work with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic and NDR Symphony Orchestra Hamburg, he regularly conducts other major European ensembles such as the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Zurich's Tonhalle Orchestra, Munich's Bayerischer Rundfunk, the Orchestre National de Lyon, and the Mahler Chamber Orchestra. In Asia, Gilbert frequently conducts in Japan - where he took his Stockholm orchestra on a critically acclaimed tour last season - and he enjoys a strong relationship with the NHK Symphony Orchestra. He has also worked with the Tokyo Symphony, the Sapporo Symphony Orchestra, and the New Japan Philharmonic. In China he has conducted the China Broadcasting Symphony Orchestra in a nationally televised concert from Beijing.

    EMANUEL AX was born in Lvov, Poland, and moved to Winnipeg, Canada, with his family when he was a young boy. His studies at the Juilliard School were greatly supported by the sponsorship of the Epstein Scholarship Program of the Boys Clubs of America, and he subsequently won the Young Concert Artists Award. His piano teacher was Mieczyslaw Munz. Emanuel Ax is a graduate of Columbia University, where he majored in French. Ax captured public attention in 1974 when, at age 25, he won the First Arthur Rubinstein International Piano Competition in Tel Aviv. In 1975 he won the Michaels Award of Young Concert Artists and, four years later, took the coveted Avery Fisher Prize. He has been an exclusive Sony Classical recording artist since 1987, making his debut on that label with a collection of Chopin scherzos and mazurkas. His releases over the last few years have included a Grammy-award winning album of Haydn piano sonatas, part of an ongoing Haydn cycle; the two Liszt concertos, paired with the Schoenberg concerto; three solo Brahms albums, and an album of tangos by Astor Piazzolla. Other releases include two discs containing Chopin's complete works for piano and orchestra, recorded on an 1851 Érard piano with the period-instrument Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment under Sir Charles Mackerras, and the Brahms Piano Concerto No. 2 with Bernard Haitink and the Boston Symphony Orchestra. In recent years, Ax has turned his attention toward the music of contemporary composers, performing works by such diverse figures as Sir Michael Tippett, Hans Werner Henze, Paul Hindemith, Ezra Laderman, Peter Lieberson, Joseph Schwantner, William Bolcom, André Previn, and Aaron Copland. In September 1997, he gave the world premiere of John Adams' piano concerto, Century Rolls, with the Cleveland Orchestra, followed in 1998 by the European premiere with the Concertgebouw Orchestra, the New York premiere at Carnegie Hall with the Cleveland Orchestra in April 2000, and its Los Angeles premiere in February 2001 with the Los Angeles Philharmonic under the composer's direction. In May 1999 he gave the premiere of another concerto written for him, Seeing for Piano and Orchestra by Christopher Rouse, with the New York Philharmonic. He resides in New York City with his wife, pianist Yoko Nozaki, their son, Joseph, and their daughter, Sarah.

    The Los Angeles Philharmonic Association, under Music Director Esa-Pekka Salonen, presents the finest in orchestral and chamber music, recitals, new music, jazz, world music and holiday concerts at two of the most remarkable places anywhere to experience music - Walt Disney Concert Hall and the Hollywood Bowl. In addition to a 30-week winter subscription season at Walt Disney Concert Hall, the LA Phil presents a 12-week summer festival at the legendary Hollywood Bowl, summer home of the Los Angeles Philharmonic and home of the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra. In fulfilling its commitment to the community, the Association's involvement with Los Angeles extends to educational programs, community concerts and children's programming, ever seeking to provide inspiration and delight to the broadest possible audience.

    EDITORS PLEASE NOTE:

    FRIDAY, OCTOBER 27, 11 AM

    SATURDAY, OCTOBER 28, 8 PM

    SUNDAY, OCTOBER 29, 2 PM


    WALT DISNEY CONCERT HALL, 111 S. Grand Avenue, Los Angeles

    LOS ANGELES PHILHARMONIC

    ALAN GILBERT, conductor

    EMANUEL AX, pianist

    MOZART Don Giovanni Overture

    MOZART Piano Concerto No. 9, K. 271

    STRAUSS Serenade

    STRAUSS Der Rosenkavalier Suite

    Upbeat Live pre-concert events take place in BP Hall one hour prior to the Saturday and Sunday concerts, and are free to all ticket holders. The Friday Upbeat Live begins at 9:45 a.m in the auditorium. Lucinda Carver, pianist and conductor is speaker.

    Tickets ($15-$135) are on sale now online at LAPhil.com, at the Walt Disney Concert Hall Box Office, or via credit card phone order at 323.850.2000. When available, choral bench seats ($15) will be released for sale to selected Philharmonic, Colburn Celebrity Recital, and Baroque Variations performances beginning at noon on the Tuesday of the second week prior to the concert. A limited number of $10 rush tickets for seniors and full time students may be available at the Walt Disney Concert Hall Box Office two hours prior to the performance. Valid identification is required; one ticket per person; cash only. Groups of 12 or more may be eligible for special discounts for selected concerts and seating areas. For all information, please call 323.850.2000.

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  • Contact:

    Adam Crane, 213.972.3408; Rachelle Roe 213.972.7310; Photos: 213.972.3034