MAURICE RAVEL (1875-1937)
Piano Concerto in G Major (1929-31)
Ravel had just returned to France from his successful 1928 concert tour of America when he began composing his one-movement Piano Concerto in G, and simultaneously working on his Piano Concerto for the Left Hand; both works carry the imprint of the jazz craze then sweeping this country and Europe. He had had an introduction to America’s indigenous music from none other than George Gershwin, with whom he visited Harlem jazz clubs. Though he had originally planned to be the soloist for the new concerto, Ravel found himself too pressed for time. He wrote to a friend: “In the midst of my pregnancy with the concerto (I am at the stage of throwing up) I am suddenly called to Biarritz,” where he was attending a festival organized in his honor. That, combined with the commission from Paul Wittgenstein for the Left Hand Piano Concerto, and the debilitating effects of the brain tumor that would lead his death, left him unable to prepare adequately for a performance. Though he was on the podium, he asked his long-time interpreter Marguerite Long to take over the solo role at the 1932 premiere. A bracing whack (made by a “slap stick” or “whip” in the percussion section) sends piano and orchestra off on an effervescent romp that includes both jazzy, bluesy riffs and sensuous, lyrical passages. The slightly offbeat main theme of the opening Allegramente is played first by the piccolo and then echoed by the trumpet, with the piano all the while showing off with glissandos and arpeggios. Ravel himself was astonished at what he accomplished in the gorgeous pages of the second section, saying that it “flowed so easily, so easily!...yet I put it together bar by bar and it nearly killed me.” The final Presto is a veritable whirlwind of sound, again drawing on jazz. You’ll hear shrieks from the woodwinds, slides on the trombone, and muted trumpets all in a breathless dash to the finish.

FRANZ SCHUBERT (1797-1828)
Symphony in C major, Great (1825-26)
For many composers, their ninth symphonies turned out to be their last completed (and often their most admired or most beloved) symphonic works, with death cutting off attempts at a tenth. This season, the Philharmonic is performing final masterpieces by Dvorák, Bruckner, and the present symphony. Strangely, in Schubert’s case, it was the Eighth he left “Unfinished.” The date of composition of the Ninth Symphony has been the subject of lively debate (along with the subject of numbering his symphonies), but it is believed by music scholars that it was completed around 1825-26, and undoubtedly derived inspiration from a performance of Beethoven’s Ninth that Schubert had heard. Schubert had actually presented the score to the Society of the Friends of Music, which deemed it too long and difficult to play. Subsequently the symphony lay forgotten for 11 years, until Robert Schumann rediscovered it in “a fabulous pile” of unpublished manuscripts at the home of Ferdinand Schubert, the late composer’s brother, and brought it to the attention of Felix Mendelssohn, who conducted its premiere in 1839. It’s always fascinating to hear one composer respond to the music of another. In connection with Schubert’s Ninth, Robert Schumann’s letter to his beloved fiancé Clara sparkles with the excitement of hearing it: “Today I have been in seventh heaven. At the rehearsal they played a symphony by Franz Schubert. If only you had been there! For I cannot describe it to you; all the instruments were like human voices, and immensely full of life and wit, and the instrumentation, regardless of Beethoven—and the length, the divine length, like a four-volume novel…I was utterly happy, with nothing left to wish for except that you were my wife and I could write such symphonies myself…” So the nickname of this C Major Symphony refers not just to its grandeur and power, but also to its length: “Great” distinguishes it from Schubert’s earlier and shorter Sixth Symphony, also in the key of C Major, dubbed “Little.” From its majestic introductory horn call to the finale where he salutes Beethoven with a variant on the “Ode to Joy” theme, the “Great” is an aptly named masterwork.

Riccardo Muti was born in Naples, Italy, where he studied piano at the Conservatory of San Pietro a Majella under Vincenzo Vitale, graduating with distinction. He was subsequently awarded a diploma in composition and conducting by the Conservatory “Giuseppe Verdi,” Milan. He first came to the attention of critics and the public in 1967, when he was unanimously awarded first place in the Guido Cantelli Conductors Competition in Milan. The following year he was appointed principal conductor of the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, a position he maintained until 1980. In 1971 he was invited by Herbert von Karajan to conduct at the Salzburg Festival, the first of many occasions that led, in 2001, to a celebration of 30 years of artistic collaboration.

During the 1970s Mr. Muti was the London Philharmonia’s chief conductor (1972–82), succeeding Otto Klemperer. In 1980 he succeeded Eugene Ormandy as music director of The Philadelphia Orchestra, where he remained until 1992. From 1986 to 2005 he was music director of Milan’s Teatro alla Scala, overseeing projects such as the Mozart-Da Ponte Trilogy and the Wagner Ring Cycle, in addition to bringing many less-performed and neglected works to light. His long tenure culminated on December 7, 2004, in the re-opening of the restored La Scala, with Salieri’s Europa riconosciuta, originally commissioned for La Scala’s inaugural opening night performance in 1778.

Over the course of his career, Riccardo Muti has conducted most of the world’s important orchestras, including the Berlin Philharmonic, Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre National de France, and the Vienna Philharmonic, an orchestra with which he has particularly close ties, and with which he has appeared at the Salzburg Festival since 1971. In April 2003 the French national radio channel, France Musique, broadcast a “Journée Riccardo Muti,” comprising 14 hours of his operatic and symphonic recordings. On December 14, 2003, he conducted the opening concert of the newly-renovated opera house “La Fenice” in Venice. In 2004 Mr. Muti founded the “Luigi Cherubini” Youth Orchestra comprising young musicians selected by an international committee from 600 instrumentalists throughout Italy. With the Cherubini Orchestra he is leading a five-year project dedicated to the Neapolitan School of the 18th century for the Salzburg Whitsun Festival.

On May 5, 2008, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Association appointed Mr. Muti as its tenth music director; he will begin his five-year contract in September 2010. In the same season he will start as director of the Rome Opera House. Riccardo Muti’s last appearance with the New York Philharmonic was in November 2009. He is scheduled to return on April 14–17, 2010. For more information, visit www.riccardomuti.com.

Pianist Mitsuko Uchida performs throughout the world and with many different partners. Highlights include her artist-in-residency at The Cleveland Orchestra, where she directed all the Mozart concertos from the keyboard over a number of seasons. She has also been the focus of a Carnegie Hall Perspectives series entitled “Mitsuko Uchida: Vienna Revisited.” She was featured in the Amsterdam’s Royal Concertgebouw Carte Blanche series, where she collaborated with tenor Ian Bostridge, the Hagen Quartet, Chamber Orchestra of Europe, and the Royal Concertgebouw, as well as directing, from the piano, a performance of Schoenberg’s Pierrot Lunaire. This season, Ms. Uchida is artist-inresidence with the Berlin Philharmonic, which will include performances of Schumann’s Piano Concerto with Sir Simon Rattle, and a series of four chamber music concerts. She is also artist-in-residence at the Vienna Konzerthaus and at the Salzburg Mozartwoche.

Ms. Uchida opened the London Symphony Orchestra’s season with Sir Colin Davis. In 2008–09 she also is working with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra and Mariss Jansons and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra and Seiji Ozawa. She tours with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe and the Philharmonia Orchestra; plays and directs The Cleveland Orchestra; gives recitals in Carnegie Hall, the Royal Festival Hall, and Vienna’s Konzerthaus; and performs at the Salzburg Festival with cellist Clemens Hagen and violinist Mark Steinberg, and with mezzo-soprano Magdalena Kožená. Ms. Uchida last appeared with the New York Philharmonic in March 2007, performing Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 19, and the Piano Concerto No. 10 for two pianos with Radu Lupu, conducted by Sir Colin Davis.