“New York City is the most fluid, pressure-packed, and cosmopolitan metropolis the modern world has ever seen,” says Pulitzer Prize–winner Wynton Marsalis. “The speed, freedom, and intensity of our relationships to each other — and to the city itself — forces us onto a collective super highway unlike any other in our country.”
Last night Music Director Alan Gilbert led the Philharmonic and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis in the World Premiere of The Jungle (Symphony No. 4), the jazz legend’s depiction of New York as super highway.
The Philharmonic commissioned The Jungle — the third original work the Philharmonic has commissioned from Marsalis — as the first of The New York Commissions, through which the Philharmonic is celebrating its long history as an active commissioner and New York cultural institution by commissioning works on New York–inspired themes from New York–based composers with ties to the Orchestra, on the occasion of the Philharmonic’s 175th anniversary. The remaining two New York Commissions, by Julia Wolfe and Sean Shepherd, will be premiered in the 2018–19 season.
This week’s concerts are almost sold out, but tickets are still available for January 3. Catch it at nyphil.org/marsalis.
(Photo: Chris Lee)
