FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE December 17, 2015 Contact: Katherine E. Johnson (212) 875-5718; [email protected]

JUANJO MENA and JAMES EHNES TO RETURN TO NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC

BEETHOVEN’s Concerto BRUCKNER’s Symphony No. 6

January 27–30, 2016

Juanjo Mena will return to the New York Philharmonic to lead Beethoven’s Violin Concerto, with James Ehnes as soloist, and Bruckner’s Symphony No. 6 (Ed. Nowak), Wednesday, January 27, 2016, at 7:30 p.m.; Thursday, January 28 at 7:30 p.m.; Friday, January 29 at 8:00 p.m.; and Saturday, January 30 at 8:00 p.m.

Chief Conductor of the BBC Philharmonic, Spanish conductor Juanjo Mena made his New York Philharmonic debut in the 2014–15 season leading works by Rimsky-Korsakov, Debussy, Tchaikovsky, and Rachmaninoff with Daniil Trifonov as soloist. The New York Times wrote that Mr. Mena led “with brisk efficiency and lightness of texture. … the orchestra obliged with bright playing and an energy that remained dignified.” The Telegraph said of his 2011 performance of Bruckner’s Sixth Symphony with the BBC Philharmonic: “Rarely have I heard a Bruckner Sixth that displayed such masterful long-term vision, and never, I think, one that made the work seem so important.”

James Ehnes made his New York Philharmonic debut performing Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto, led by Roberto Minczuk, at the Concerts in the Parks in July 2003; he performed the same work for his most recent appearance, during a July 2012 Concerts in the Parks performance led by Andrey Boreyko, and has performed with the Orchestra on tour and on subscription.

Related Events  Philharmonic Free Fridays The New York Philharmonic is offering 100 free tickets for young people ages 13–26 to the concert Friday, January 29 as part of Philharmonic Free Fridays. Information is available at nyphil.org/freefridays. Philharmonic Free Fridays offers 100 free tickets to 13–26-year-olds to each of the 2015–16 season’s 15 Friday evening subscription concerts.

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 Pre-Concert Insights Composer Victoria Bond will introduce the program. Pre-Concert Insights take place one hour before these performances in the Helen Hull Room, unless otherwise noted. Pre-Concert Insights are $7, and discounts are available for three (3) or more talks and for students. Attendance is limited to 90 people. Information: nyphil.org/preconcert or (212) 875-5656.

Artists Chief Conductor of the BBC Philharmonic, Juanjo Mena is one of Spain’s most distinguished international conductors. Following his New York Philharmonic debut last season and recent appearances with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Montreal and Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestras, and The Cleveland Orchestra, Mr. Mena’s North American 2015–16 season includes return visits to New York, Baltimore, Boston, Toronto, and Cincinnati. His worldwide highlights include his debut with the Berlin Philharmonic and a tour of China and South Korea with the BBC Philharmonic, as well as return visits to the Danish National Symphony Orchestra, Oslo and Bergen Philharmonic orchestras, Spanish National Orchestra, and Dresden Philharmonic Orchestra. As a guest of international festivals, Mr. Mena has appeared at the Hollywood Bowl, Grant Park (Chicago), Tanglewood, La Folle Journée (Nantes), and the Stars of White Nights Festival in St. Petersburg, Russia. He recently led the BBC Philharmonic on two tours of Europe and Spain — including performances in Cologne, Frankfurt, Munich, Vienna, and Madrid — and performs with them every year at the BBC Proms in London. Juanjo Mena has worked with orchestras throughout Europe, such as the Orchestre National de France, Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse, Oslo Philharmonic, Filarmonica della Scala, Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della RAI, Munich Radio Orchestra, Dresden Philharmonic, Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, Danish National Symphony Orchestra, and Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra, as well as with all the major orchestras in Spain. His operatic work includes Wagner’s The Flying Dutchman, Bartók’s Bluebeard’s Castle, Schoenberg’s Erwartung, ’s Salome, Elektra, and Ariadne auf Naxos, and productions including Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin in Genoa, Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro in Lausanne, and Britten’s Billy Budd in Bilbao. He has made several recordings with the BBC Philharmonic, including discs of works by Manuel de Falla (named BBC Music Magazine Recording of the Month) and Gabriel Pierné (Gramophone Editor’s Choice), and acclaimed recent releases of music by Montsalvatge, Weber, and Turina. He has also recorded a collection of Basque symphonic music with the Bilbao Symphony Orchestra for Naxos, and a critically acclaimed recording of Messiaen’s Turangalîla-symphonie for Hyperion with the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra. Juanjo Mena made his New York Philharmonic debut in December 2014–January 2015 leading works by Rimsky-Korsakov, Debussy, and Tchaikovsky, as well as Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 1 with Daniil Trifonov as soloist.

Violinist James Ehnes has appeared in more than 30 countries on five continents. In the 2015– 16 season, Mr. Ehnes performs concerts with the Mozarteumorchester Salzburg, Royal Philharmonic, Orchestre National de France, and the Danish National, Melbourne, Sydney, San Diego, and National symphony orchestras. He returns to London’s Wigmore Hall for two recitals, embarks on an extensive national recital tour of Canada, and appears with the Ehnes Quartet on tour in Europe, South Korea, and across North America. He also leads the winter and summer festivals of the Seattle Society, where he is the artistic director. Mr. (more) Juanjo Mena / James Ehnes / 3

Ehnes has an extensive discography of more than 40 recordings featuring music ranging from J.S. Bach to . Recent projects include Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons, Franck and R. Strauss sonatas, ’s Two Movements (with Bells), four Bartók CDs, Prokofiev’s complete works for violin, Tchaikovsky’s complete works for violin, and discs of the music of Berlioz, Janáček, Khachaturian, Shostakovich, and Britten. Upcoming releases include works by Debussy, Respighi, Elgar, and Beethoven. His recordings have been honored with many international awards and prizes, including a Grammy, Gramophone, and ten JUNO awards. Born in 1976 in Brandon, , Canada, James Ehnes began violin studies at the age of four, and at age nine he became a protégé of the noted Canadian violinist Francis Chaplin. He studied with Sally Thomas at the Meadowmount School of Music, and from 1993 to 1997 he studied at The . He is a Member of the Order of Canada. James Ehnes plays the “Marsick” Stradivarius of 1715. Mr. Ehnes made his New York Philharmonic debut performing Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto, led by Roberto Minczuk, at the Concerts in the Parks in July 2003; he performed the same work for his most recent appearance, during a July 2012 Concerts in the Parks performance led by Andrey Boreyko.

Repertoire (1770–1827) composed his only Violin Concerto in 1806 for the virtuoso Franz Clement (principal violinist and conductor at the Theater an der Wien). Beethoven finished it just in time for the premiere at a Christmas-time concert at which, as the stories go, Clement stopped between movements to perform his own Fantasia with circus-like gimmicks, including playing his violin upside-down. Beethoven’s concerto entered the standard repertoire only after 1844, when it was championed by Joseph Joachim (at the time a 12-year-old violin wunderkind), who performed it with the Philharmonic Society of London conducted by Mendelssohn. The New York Philharmonic’s first performance of the concerto was in December 1861, with Edward Mollenhauer as the soloist and conducted by Theodore Eisfeld. Its most recent presentation was on the EUROPE / WINTER 2012 tour with soloist Frank Peter Zimmermann, the 2011–12 Mary and James G. Wallach Artist-in-Residence, conducted by Alan Gilbert.

History was slow to recognize the greatness of the symphonies of Anton Bruckner (1824–96), which reconciled the conflicting forces of Romanticism and Classicism. An organist as well as the most important composer of choral church music of the late 19th century, Bruckner lived in Vienna under Brahms’s shadow but was also frequently described as a disciple of Wagner. Due in part to their cathedral-like proportions and often weighty character, his symphonies did not achieve widespread popularity outside Germanic countries until well into the 20th century — with the Symphonies Nos. 4 and 7 leading the way. The Symphony No. 6 was composed between 1879 and 1881 but was not performed in its entirety until 1901. The work expresses its composer’s deeply religious spirit, with chorale-like themes, large blocks of sound reminiscent of contrasting registers on an organ manual — Bruckner was a noted organist — and a monumental scale of construction. The New York Philharmonic will perform Bruckner’s original 1881 score, as published by the musicologist Leopold Nowak in 1952. The Symphony No. 6 has been programmed by the New York Philharmonic only eight times previously: the first was in November 1912 led by Josef Stransky, and the most recent was in January 2013 led by Christoph Eschenbach. (more) Juanjo Mena / James Ehnes / 4

* * * Major support for Philharmonic Free Fridays is provided by The Pratt Foundation.

* * * Philharmonic Free Fridays was created, in part, by a donation from an anonymous donor through the New York Philharmonic’s 2014 Share the Music! campaign.

* * * Programs are supported, in part, by public funds from New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the New York State Council on the Arts, with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature.

Tickets Single tickets for this performance start at $30. Tickets for Open Rehearsals are $20. Pre- Concert Insights are $7 (visit nyphil.org/preconcert for more information). Tickets may be purchased online at nyphil.org or by calling (212) 875-5656, 10:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. Monday through Friday; 1:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. Saturday; and noon to 5:00 p.m. Sunday. Tickets may also be purchased at the David Geffen Hall Box Office. The Box Office opens at 10:00 a.m. Monday through Saturday, and at noon on Sunday. On performance evenings, the Box Office closes one-half hour after performance time; other evenings it closes at 6:00 p.m. A limited number of $16 tickets for select concerts may be available through the Internet for students within 10 days of the performance, or in person the day of. Valid identification is required. To determine ticket availability, call the Philharmonic’s Customer Relations Department at (212) 875-5656. (Ticket prices subject to change.)

For press tickets, call Lanore Carr at the New York Philharmonic at (212) 875-5714, or email her at [email protected].

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New York Philharmonic

David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center

Wednesday, January 27, 2016, 7:30 p.m. Open Rehearsal — 9:45 a.m. Thursday, January 28, 2016, 7:30 p.m. Friday, January 29, 2016, 8:00 p.m. Saturday, January 30, 2016, 8:00 p.m.

Pre-Concert Insights (one hour before each concert) with composer Victoria Bond

Juanjo Mena, conductor James Ehnes, violin

BEETHOVEN Violin Concerto BRUCKNER Symphony No. 6 (Ed. Nowak)

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ALL PROGRAMS SUBJECT TO CHANGE

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