We’re excited to have ranked on many best-of 2016 lists, and are proud of the company we’re in.
The New York Times called out the “ecstatic and mystical account” of Messiaen’s Turangalîla-symphonie led by Composer-in-Residence Esa-Pekka Salonen; the 2016 NY PHIL BIENNIAL performances, demonstrating “the vision and stamina Mr. Gilbert has brought to the Philharmonic”; and Brahms’s A German Requiem with Christoph von Dohnányi.
The New Yorker applauded Circle Map, featuring Salonen leading the Orchestra in works by Kaija Saariaho, presented by Park Avenue Armory, and the World Premiere of Ashley Fure’s Bound to the Bow, performed by the Interlochen Arts Academy Orchestra during the NY PHIL BIENNIAL.
NPR Classical ranked the Philharmonic’s Grammy-nominated album of music by former Composer-in-Residence Christopher Rouse among the “ten classical albums that saved 2016” — saying “there's unbridled splendor in hearing what a modern orchestra, revving on all cylinders, is capable of. Alan Gilbert inspires arresting detail and energy from the New York Philharmonic” — and NPR Music included the Rouse CD in its list of 2016’s top 50 albums.
WQXR’s list of 2016 new-music revelations said that “nothing should be taken for granted about the sustained scope of New York Philharmonic music director Alan Gilbert’s commitment to new music.... New classical music has never seemed more at home.... With two Biennials, CONTACT! new-music shows, composers-in-residence, ambitious multidisciplinary statements like the New York premiere of György Ligeti's opera Le Grand Macabre, Gilbert is leaving a legacy as bold in vision as methodical and inevitable in execution.”
We also made the cut for Musical America, Superconductor, and New York Classical Review.
Here’s to another great year of music-making!
(Photo: Chris Lee)