For Immediate Release: Press Contacts: October 28, 2015 Eileen Chambers, 312-294-3092 Rachelle Roe, 312-294-3090 Photos Available By Request [email protected] CONDUCTOR ZUBIN MEHTA LEADS THE ISRAEL PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA IN OPENING CONCERT OF THE 2015/16 ORCHESTRAS SERIES AT SYMPHONY CENTER Program Includes Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony, Ravel’s La valse and a work by Josef Bardanashvili Sunday, November 15, at 7 p.m. CHICAGO—The first concert of the 2015/16 Symphony Center Presents (SCP) PowerShares QQQ Orchestras series features the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra (IPO) led by conductor Zubin Mehta, who is the orchestra’s Music Director for Life. The IPO, which is Israel’s premiere cultural ambassador, celebrates its 80th anniversary in the 2015/16 season. Mehta leads a diverse program of works by Beethoven, Ravel and contemporary Israeli composer Josef Bardanashvili on Sunday, November 15, at 7 p.m. at Symphony Center. The concert marks the IPO’s fifth Symphony Center appearance since 1996 with their most recent appearance led by Mehta taking place in 2014. Mehta, an acclaimed Beethoven interpreter, leads the IPO in the composer’s monumental Symphony No. 3 (Eroica) as the program’s centerpiece. The sweeping work opens with an intense and powerful first movement that leads to a brooding funeral march, which hints at Beethoven’s struggle with his increasing deafness, before it reaches a brilliant finale. The IPO program opens with the symphonic poem A Journey to the End of the Millennium based on the critically acclaimed opera of the same name by Georgian-born, Israeli composer Josef Bardanashvili (b. 1948). The two-part work suggests a musical journey of the Jewish people from their early days through the 20th century and is based on the book by A.B. Yehoshua. Ravel’s whirling orchestral showpiece La valse rounds out the program. Zubin Mehta first conducted the IPO in 1961 when he and the orchestra were both only 25 years old. The IPO named Mehta its Music Director for Life in 1981 and celebrated 50 years of extraordinary artistic collaboration in 2011. The November 15 concert is part of an eight-city U.S. tour which also takes Mehta and the IPO to New York, San Francisco, Palm Desert, CA, Los Angeles, San Diego, Cleveland and Dallas. For a complete listing of the three programs in the 2015/16 SCP PowerShares QQQ Orchestras series, click here. Tickets for all Symphony Center Presents (SCP) PowerShares QQQ Orchestras series concerts can be purchased by phone at 800-223-7114 or 312-294-3000; online at cso.org, or at the Symphony Center box office: 220 S. Michigan Ave., Chicago, IL 60604. Discounted student tickets for select concerts can be purchased, subject to availability, online in advance or at the box office on the day of the concert. For group rates, please call 312-294- 3040. Artists, programs and prices are subject to change. # # # Symphony Center Presents Sunday, November 15, 7:00 p.m. PowerShares QQQ Orchestras Israel Philharmonic Orchestra Zubin Mehta, conductor BARDANASHVILI A Journey to the End of the Millennium RAVEL La valse BEETHOVEN Symphony No. 3 in E-flat Major, Op. 55 (Eroica) Tickets: $51-$175 The Israel Philharmonic Orchestra (IPO) One of Israel’s oldest and most influential cultural institutions since its founding in 1936, the IPO has dedicated itself to presenting the world’s greatest music to audiences in Israel and around the world. Founded by Polish violinist Bronislaw Huberman, the IPO represents the fulfillment of his dream "to unite the desire of the country for an orchestra with the desire of the Jewish musicians for a country." Its inaugural concert was conducted by Arturo Toscanini who felt his participation was a means to demonstrate his opposition to Fascism. Members traveled in armored cars to play in a besieged Jerusalem during the War of Independence. Among many Israelis, the memory of IPO Laureate Conductor Leonard Bernstein conducting the Orchestra after the battle for Beersheba is a historic moment. Under the esteemed leadership of Zubin Mehta, Music Director for Life, the IPO travels extensively throughout the world acting as Israel’s premiere cultural ambassador. Joined by Zubin Mehta and Gianandrea Noseda, Principal Guest Conductor of the Orchestra, the IPO travels to 14 cities across the United States this season. The IPO has also released over 40 live recordings on the Helicon, Sony, Deutsche Grammophon, EMI, Philips and Teldec labels. The Orchestra gives over 100 performances each year in Israel to their 26,000 subscribers in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and Haifa. Zubin Mehta Zubin Mehta was born in 1936 in Bombay and received his first musical education under his father Mehli Mehta’s guidance who was a noted concert violinist and the founder of the Bombay Symphony Orchestra. After a short period of pre-medical studies in Bombay, he left for Vienna in 1954 where he eventually entered the conducting program under Hans Swarowsky at the Akademie für Musik. Mehta won the Liverpool International Conducting Competition in 1958 and was also a prize-winner of the summer academy at Tanglewood. By 1961 he had already conducted the Vienna, Berlin and Israel Philharmonic Orchestras and has recently celebrated 50 years of musical collaboration with all three ensembles. Mehta was Music Director of the Montreal Symphony Orchestra from 1961 to 1967 and also assumed the Music Directorship of the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra in 1962, a post he retained until 1978. In 1969 he was appointed Music Adviser to the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra and was made Music Director of that orchestra in 1977. In 1981 the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra awarded him the title of Music Director for life. Mehta has conducted over three thousand concerts with this extraordinary ensemble including tours spanning five continents. In 1978 he took over the post as Music Director of the New York Philharmonic commencing a tenure lasting 13 years, the longest in the orchestra's history. Since 1985, he has been chief conductor of the Orchestra del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino in Florence. Mehta made his debut as an opera conductor with Tosca in Montreal in 1963. Since then he has conducted at the Metropolitan Opera New York, the Vienna State Opera, the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, La Scala Milano, and the opera houses of Chicago and Florence as well as at the Salzburg Festival. Between 1998 and 2006 he was Music Director of the Bavarian State Opera in Munich. In October 2006 he opened the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofia in Valencia and was the President of the annual Festival del Mediterrani in Valencia until June 2014 where he conducted the celebrated Ring cycle with the Fura del Baus in coproduction with the Florence opera house. Other Ring cycles were completed at the Chicago Opera and the Bavarian State Opera. Mehta's list of awards and honors is extensive and includes the "Nikisch-Ring" bequeathed to him by Karl Böhm. He is an honorary citizen of both Florence and Tel Aviv and was made an honorary member of the Vienna State Opera in 1997, of the Bavarian State Opera in 2006 and of the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde Wien in 2007. The title of “Honorary Conductor” was bestowed to him by the following orchestras: Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra (2001), Munich Philharmonic Orchestra (2004), Los Angeles Philharmonic (2006), Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino (2006), Staatskapelle Berlin (2014) and Bavarian State Orchestra (2006), with whom he performed in Srinagar, Kashmir in September 2013. In October 2008 Mehta was honored by the Japanese Imperial Family with the “Praemium Imperiale”. In March 2011 Mehta received a special distinction, in getting a star on the Hollywood Boulevard. The Commander’s Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany was bestowed to him in July 2012. The Indian Government honored him in September 2013 with the “Tagore Award for cultural harmony” which a year earlier was awarded to Ravi Shankar. Mehta continues to support the discovery and furtherance of musical talents all over the world. Together with his brother Zarin he is a co-chairman of the Mehli Mehta Music Foundation in Bombay where more than 200 children are educated in Western Classical Music. The Buchmann-Mehta School of Music in Tel Aviv develops young talent in Israel and is closely related to the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, as is a new project of teaching young Arab Israelis in the cities of Shwaram and Nazareth with local teachers and members of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. The Chicago Symphony Orchestra: www.cso.org and www.csosoundsandstories.org/ Founded in 1891, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra is consistently hailed as one of the greatest orchestras in the world. Since 2010, the preeminent conductor Riccardo Muti has served as its 10th music director. Pierre Boulez is the CSO’s Helen Regenstein Conductor Emeritus, Yo-Yo Ma is its Judson and Joyce Green Creative Consultant, and Samuel Adams and Elizabeth Ogonek are its Mead Composers-in-Residence. From baroque through contemporary music, the CSO commands a vast repertoire. Its renowned musicians annually perform more than 150 concerts, most at Symphony Center in Chicago and, each summer, at the suburban Ravinia Festival. They regularly tour nationally and internationally. Since 1892, the CSO has made 58 international tours, performing in 29 countries on five continents. People around the globe listen to weekly radio broadcasts of CSO concerts and recordings on the WFMT radio network and online at cso.org/radio. Recordings by the CSO have earned 62 Grammy Awards, including two in 2011 for Muti’s recording with the CSO and Chorus of Verdi's Messa da Requiem (Muti’s first of four releases with the CSO to date).