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  • ESA-PEKKA SALONEN CONDUCTS THE WORLD PREMIERE OF STEVEN STUCKY'S SECOND CONCERTO FOR ORCHESTRA IN FINAL "FIRST NIGHTS" PROGRAM OF SEASON
  • Mar. 12, 2004
  • Violinist Christian Tetzlaff is Guest Soloist in
    Bartók's Violin Concerto No. 2 for Saturday and Sunday Performances

    FRIDAY, MARCH 12, AT 8 PM (Philharmonic's First Nights Series Concludes)

    SATURDAY, MARCH 13, AT 2 PM and SUNDAY, MARCH 14, AT 2 PM
    AT WALT DISNEY CONCERT HALL

    March 12 generously funded by
    Acura and supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, National Endowment for the Arts, and the James Irvine Foundation

    Esa-Pekka Salonen conducts the Los Angeles Philharmonic in the world premiere of Steven Stucky's Second Concerto for Orchestra at Walt Disney Concert Hall in the final First Nights program of the season on Friday, March 12, at 8 p.m. Stucky's new work is commissioned by the Los Angeles Philharmonic for the inaugural season at Walt Disney Concert Hall. At the Saturday, March 13 and Sunday, March 14 concerts, the program also includes Stravinsky's Symphonies of Wind Instruments and Bartók's Violin Concerto No. 2 with acclaimed violinist Christian Tetzlaff.

    In his new work, Stucky (pictured) invokes the names of those composers upon whose shoulders he is proudly standing. The first movement, Overture (with Friends), contains homages to Ravel's Piano Concerto in G (1931), Stravinsky's early score Fireworks (1908), and two Sibelius works, En Saga (1892; rev. 1902) and the first movement of the Third Symphony (1907). However, these aren't the only "friends" referred to in the title. Translating letters of the alphabet into musical pitches, Stucky has chosen to "encode the names or initials of several significant friends and colleagues [into the work], and the resulting mottos form part of the work's thematic material." Those represented include Bernard and Lenore "Greenberg" (who underwrote the commission for this concerto), Philharmonic President Deborah "Borda," former Executive Director Ernest "Fleischmann," and Walt Disney Concert Hall architect Frank "Gehry." The most prominent motives, however, are for the work's dedicatees: "LAP," for Los Angeles Philharmonic (the notes A-A-B in Stucky's code), heard first in the trumpet in the work's opening bars, and, followed closely in the French horns and cellos, the motto "Esa-Pekka" (especially its first three notes, E-flat-A-B). These motives are nestled into bright, busy orchestral textures made of the simple elements of ascending and descending scales, flashy arpeggios, and repeating rhythmic ostinati.

    Upbeat Live pre-concert events take place one hour prior to each concert in BP Hall at Walt Disney Concert Hall, and are free to all ticket holders. Composer Steven Stucky will be joined by musicologist Christopher Hailey (Friday and Sunday) and composer Christopher Anderson-Bazzoli (Saturday).

    The March 12th performance concludes the Los Angeles Philharmonic's First Nights Series. For the March 12th program, Stucky will discuss the compositional process, his influences, and other specific information about his Second Concerto.

    STEVEN STUCKY (born 1949) is widely recognized as one of the leading American composers of his generation. He has written commissioned works for many of the major American orchestras, including Baltimore, Chicago, Cincinnati, Los Angeles, Minnesota, Philadelphia, and St. Louis, as well as for Chanticleer, the Boston Musica Viva, the Camerata Bern, the Koussevitzky Foundation, the Barlow Endowment, the Howard Hanson Institute of American Music, Carnegie Hall, the BBC, recorder soloist Michala Petri, and guitarist Manuel Barrueco. Stucky is also active as a conductor. In addition to composing and conducting, Stucky is active as writer, lecturer, and teacher. From 1988, to 1992 he was Composer-in-Residence and New Music Advisor of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and he continues to serve as the orchestra's Consulting Composer for New Music. He was Composer-in-Residence of the Aspen Music Festival and School in summer 2001. A well-known expert on the music of the late Polish composer Witold Lutoslawski, Stucky won the ASCAP Deems Taylor Prize for his 1981 book Lutoslawski and His Music (Cambridge University Press). Stucky has taught at Cornell University since 1980, where he serves as Given Foundation Professor of Composition, and where he chaired the Music Department from 1992 to 1997. At present he is also Visiting Professor of Composition at the Eastman School of Music.

    Violinist CHRISTIAN TETZLAFF has performed and recorded a broad spectrum of the repertoire, ranging from Bach to 19th-century masterworks by Mendelssohn, Beethoven, and Brahms; from 20th-century concertos by Bartók, Berg, and Stravinsky to world premieres of contemporary works. Since the performances of the Schoenberg Violin Concerto that brought him to international attention just over a decade ago - with Christoph von Dohnányi and the Cleveland Orchestra and with Sergiu Celibidache and the Munich Philharmonic - Tetzlaff has performed with conductors such as Vladimir Ashkenazy, Christoph Eschenbach, Franz Welser-Möst, Esa-Pekka Salonen, and Roger Norrington; with the orchestras of Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, San Francisco, and Toronto, as well as the Berlin Philharmonic, the London Symphony Orchestra, the Royal Concertgebouw, and the Vienna Philharmonic. Tetzlaff also frequently performs chamber music with artists such as pianist Leif Ove Andsnes, cellist Yo-Yo Ma, clarinetist Sabine Meyer, and cellist Heinrich Schiff. Tetzlaff was born in Hamburg in 1966 into a minister's family, and music occupied a central place in his upbringing. He began intensive study of the violin at the age of 14, just after making his concert debut in the Beethoven Violin Concerto, and worked with Uwe-Martin Haiberg at the conservatory in Lübeck.

    Actor, producer, and director JOHN DE LANCIE is well-known for his work in television, film, and theater, and on the concert stage. Some of his film and television credits include The Hand that Rocks the Cradle, The Fisher King, The West Wing, Sports Night, Judging Amy, Star Trek, Legend, LA Law, Picket Fences, Civil Wars, The Practice, and Touched by an Angel. He has been a member of the American Shakespeare Festival, the Seattle Repertory Company, the South Coast Repertory, and the Mark Taper Forum. In the world of music, de Lancie has performed with many orchestras nationwide, including Esa-Pekka Salonen and the Los Angeles Philharmonic for whom he has been the host of Toyota Symphonies for Youth for the last five years, helping to develop new programming for young people. To date, he has conceived and directed ten symphony orchestra "events." These 90-minute programs, written and directed by de Lancie, include fully theatricalized productions of Romeo and Juliet, A Midsummer Night's Dream (with the Korngold score), The Bourgeois Gentleman, and The Abduction from the Seraglio. Performances of these "events" have taken place at the Ravinia Festival, Pasadena Civic Auditorium, and the Music Center in Los Angeles. He is a graduate of Kent State University and the Juilliard School.

    EDITORS PLEASE NOTE:

    FRIDAY, MARCH 12, at 8 PM

    SATURDAY, MARCH 13, at 2 PM

    SUNDAY, MARCH 14, at 2 PM

    Walt Disney Concert Hall

    111 S. Grand Avenue, Los Angeles

    LOS ANGELES PHILHARMONIC

    ESA-PEKKA SALONEN, conductor

    JOHN deLANCIE, series writer/narrator/director for FIRST NIGHTS

    CHRISTIAN TETZLAFF, violin *

    STRAVINSKY Symphonies of Wind Instruments*

    BARTÓK Violin Concerto No. 2 *

    STUCKY Second Concerto for Orchestra

    * [Except 3/12]

    March 12 generously funded by Acura and supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the James Irvine Foundation.

    Upbeat Live pre-concert events take place one hour prior to each concert in BP Hall at Walt Disney Concert Hall, and are free to all ticket holders. Composer Steven Stucky will be joined by musicologist Christopher Hailey (Friday and Sunday) and composer Christopher Anderson-Bazzoli (Saturday).

    Tickets ($15 - $120) are on sale now at the Walt Disney Concert Hall Box Office, online at LAPhil.com, 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:

    Rachelle Roe, 213.972.7310; Ellie Lloyd, 213.972.3448; for photos: Beth Norber, 213.972.3409