Thursday Evening, December 17, 2015, at 8:00Isaac Stern Auditorium/Ronald O. Perelman StageConductor’s Notes Q&A with Leon Botstein at 7:00

presents

Russia’s Jewish ComposersLEON BOTSTEIN, Conductor

ALEKSANDR KREIN The Rose and the Cross (“Symphonic Fragments after Aleksandr Blok”), Op. 26 (NY Premiere)

The Castle of Archimbault at DawnThe Rooms of IsaureOn the Ocean ShoreGaetan’s SongThe Death of Bertrand: Epilog

ANTON RUBINSTEIN Cello Concerto No. 2 in D minor, Op. 96Allegro moderatoAndanteAllegro(no pause between movements)

ISTVÁN VÁRDAI, Cello

Intermission

PLEASE SWITCH OFF YOUR CELL PHONES AND OTHER ELECTRONIC DEVICES.

FROM THEMusic DirectorJews and Russians: The Case of Musicby Leon Botstein

The history of the Jews in Russia,before and during the first decades afterthe 1917 revolution, is a complex amal-gam of segregation, poverty, exclusion,persecution, and extraordinary intellec-tual and cultural achievement bothwithin the confines of Jewish societyand culture and also outside in thelarger non-Jewish Russian world. Thesignificance of Russian Jewry to thedevelopment of modern Russian cul-ture, and indeed to the central elementsof the modern Russian national self-image, cannot be overestimated.

It is therefore not surprising that fromthe very start of communism and theSoviet Union, Jews were treated as adistinct nation rather than a religiousgroup, comparable to the Georgians orthe Armenians. Jews were given status

as such. Yiddish rather than Hebrewwas considered the Jewish national lan-guage and under Soviet rule (until thedevastating purges of the late 1940sduring Stalin’s final years), the Yiddishlanguage, and the theater and musicassociated with Yiddish culture, receivedextensive state patronage. The sup-posed elevation of Jews to a nationalstatus, however, was both ambivalentand disingenuous. It was designed toblunt the allure of Zionism and Hebrew,as well as to circumvent, with a fatalembrace, the hope that under commu-nism, anti-Semitism would disappear.The official recognition of Jewish nation-ality actually ensured the persistence ofanti-Semitism; after all, on all officialdocuments, including passports, one’snationality was identified. Every Jewwas labeled as such.

All the composers on this program wereRussian Jews by birth. The oldest is the

MIKHAIL GNESIN From Shelley (“Symphonic Fragment after Percy Bysshe Shelley’s Prometheus Unbound”),Op. 4 (U.S. Premiere)

MAXIMILIAN STEINBERG Symphony No. 1 in D major, Op. 3 (U.S. Premiere)

Allegro non troppo—Poco più tranquillo—Tempo I

Scherzo: Allegro vivace—Un poco più tranquillo—Tempo I

Andante molto sostenutoFinale: Allegro moderato

This evening’s concert will run approximately two hours and 15 minutes including one 20-minute intermission.

American Symphony Orchestra welcomes the many organizations who participate in our CommunityAccess Program, which provides free and low-cost tickets to underserved groups in New York’s five

boroughs. For information on how you can support this program, please call (212) 868-9276.

piano virtuoso, conductor, and com-poser Anton Rubinstein, whose fame—particularly in the United States—waslegendary. Rubinstein, who taughtTchaikovsky, also was chosen to leadthe celebrated Gesellschaft der Musik-freunde in Vienna. His works won wideacclaim. Posterity, however, has beenless kind. Despite its once enormouspopularity, his “Ocean” symphony haslapsed into obscurity, together with therest of his orchestral oeuvre. Rubinstein’sfamily (including his almost equallyfamous musician brother Nikolai) con-verted from Judaism when Anton was ayoung boy. Rubinstein was brought upas a Christian but like so many convertshe realized that baptism was never acure or antidote for anti-Semitism, sincethe prejudice was racial and political,not theological—once a Jew, always aJew. Rubinstein is alleged to haveobserved, “Russians say I am German,Germans think me Russian, Jews callme a Christian, and Christians say I ama Jew.”

The fact is that more of Rubinstein’smusic deserves to be played, as this con-certo for cello and orchestra makes clear.Rubinstein’s musical output was enor-mous. Much of the best music was dra-matic music written for the stage. A vastnumber of dramatic works with a “Jew-ish” connection appear in Rubinstein’scatalogue, including an opera on theMaccabees, works on the Tower ofBabel and Moses, all alongside worksexplicitly on Christian subjects (mostnotably a setting of Paradise Lost). Inthe late 19th-century debate on whatought to be truly “Russian” music,Rubinstein was unfairly derided as asecond-rate purveyor of German musi-cal traditions.

Two of the Russian Jewish composerson this program are represented withworks written when they were young.Both Krein and Gnesin became prominent

for their contributions as explicitly“Jewish” composers. Both men, influ-enced by Rimsky-Korsakov, celebratedthe folk roots of their own specificnational origin as Jews. They becameleading members of the legendary andseminal St. Petersburg Society for Jew-ish Folk Music, founded in 1908.

Yet the works on this program remindus that their distinction and contribu-tion as composers were not limited tothe extent to which they utilized theirJewishness in their music. It is easy tooverlook the extent of acculturationand symbiosis between the Jewish andthe Russian in ways that bypassed theFiddler on the Roof stereotype; we asso-ciate that process of cosmopolitanintermingling more readily with the his-torical dynamics between Jews andnon-Jews in German-speaking Europebefore 1933. Krein and Gnesin absorbedand extended—as did their contempo-raries Joseph Achron, Lazare Saminsky,and Sergei Prokofiev—the influence ofsymbolism and of Scriabin and Rimsky.Gnesin and Krein, at the time they wrotethe works on this program, were Russ-ian cosmopolitan advocates of an avant-garde first and Jewish culture second.

The last work on the program is by arival and contemporary of Stravinsky’s,Shostakovich’s teacher MaximilianSteinberg. One of the ironies of historyis that Steinberg’s ballet Metamorpho-sen was scheduled for the same 1913season as the Rite of Spring, andStravinsky, who was jealous that Rimskyfavored Steinberg and that Steinbergmarried Rimsky’s daughter, did every-thing he could to thwart Steinberg’scompeting work.

Steinberg was the son of a majorHebrew scholar. Despite his extensivebackground in Jewish history and cul-ture, unlike Krein and Gnesin, butrather more as a latter day Rubinstein,

Steinberg did not privilege his Jewishidentity in his work and chose a quiteeclectic array of inspirations for hismusic—from Uzbek folk material to thelegend of Till Eulenspeigel. As Steinberg’searly symphonies—and the 1913 balletscore—suggest, the talent and facility ofthe young composer were extraordi-nary, as was his familiarity with thecompositional traditions of WesternEurope and Russia.

Steinberg is most often remembered notfor his music but indirectly, first onaccount of his place in Stravinsky’s life,and second because of his connection toShostakovich. He deserves more. None -theless, perhaps the most admirableindirect consequence of Steinberg’scareer derives from the Shostakovichconnection, not the link to Stravinsky.Shostakovich was rather the exceptionamong Russian composers in his com-plete lack of anti-Semitism. IndeedShostakovich identified with the plightof the Jews. He showed rare courage inhis support of the family of SolomonMikhoels, the great Yiddish actor whowas killed by Stalin in 1948, and his pro-tective advocacy of and friendship withthe Polish Jewish composer MieczysławWeinberg, who settled in Russia after1945. Perhaps it was Shostakovich’sadmiration and affection for his teacherthat sustained his decency and courageon this issue.

Together these four Russian composers,whose lives and careers span the secondhalf of the 19th century and the firsthalf of the 20th—arguably the heydayof classical musical culture—reveal theextent of acculturation, integration,and participation in Russian intellec-tual and artistic life by Jews. We havethe unfortunate tendency to reduce thecomplexity of the past to stereotypes.The Jews of Russia evoke—legitimately—the image of mass poverty, the shtetl,sardonic humor, klezmer, and Yiddisheloquence: a distinctly Jewish cultureborn out of the unique experience ofthe Pale Settlement. It is to those rootsthat Krein and Gnesin—much like theyoung painter Marc Chagall—eventuallyturned in search of a unique source fora modern art and culture of their own.By so doing they were following a par-allel pattern of discovery that wouldbecome audible in the music of Bartókand Stravinsky.

This concert reminds us that in litera-ture, science, art, and above all, music,there was a Russian Jewish elite, fullyconversant with Russian and Europeantraditions that made seminal contribu-tions to the mainstream of culture andart without foregrounding or even ref-erencing their status as Jews. Thatremarkable achievement by an extraor-dinary elite is highlighted on today’sconcert program.

THE Programby Peter Laki

Aleksandr KreinBorn October 20, 1883, in Nizhniy-Novgorod, Russia

Died April 21, 1951, in Staraya Ruza, Russia

The Rose and the Cross (“Symphonic Fragments after Aleksandr Blok”), Op. 26Composed in 1917–21

Performance Time: Approximately 20 minutes

Instruments for this performance: 2 flutes, 1 piccolo, 2 oboes, 1 English horn, 2 clarinets, 1 bass clarinet, 2 bassoons, 1 contrabassoon, 5 French horns, 3 trumpets,3 trombones, 1 tuba, timpani, percussion (cymbals, tam-tam), 2 harps, 22 violins,

8 violas, 8 cellos, and 6 double basses

Aleksandr Blok, perhaps the greatestRussian symbolist poet, died in 1921,four years after the October Revolution.Although he had welcomed the Revolu-tion, he was hardly a Communist and bythe time of his death at the age of 41, hehad become disillusioned with the Bol-sheviks. Blok had a great affinity formusic; his mystical drama The Rose andthe Cross was originally planned as aballet whose score was to have beenwritten by Aleksandr Glazunov. (In1914 Mikhail Gnesin composed inci-dental music for the play.)

In the event, the play had more than200 rehearsals at the Moscow Art The-ater but was never performed in public.In his book Russian Opera and the Sym-bolist Movement, Simon Morrison offersthe following summary of Blok’s play:

The plot brings together dissimilarcharacters, settings, images, and events:a grief-stricken lady and a dejectedknight, a dilapidated castle and awindswept beach, the bells of a sunkencity and a ghost in a dungeon, a peas-ant dance around a decorated tree

and a song contest in a floweringdale. The spring that sets the plot inmotion is a song so provocative thatit haunts the dramatis personae foryears after they hear it performed byan itinerant troubadour. The trouba-dour reappears at the drama’s endfor an encore performance…thesong’s pastoral text identifies joy andsuffering as equivalent emotionalstates. Its music was intended tomesmerize its listeners—both thoseon and off the stage.

Krein was deeply steeped in Eastern Euro-pean klezmer musical traditions, and themajority of his works were inspired byJewish folklore. But not all of his worksare Jewish in inspiration, and he honoredBlok’s memory, a few years after the poet’sdeath, with the present five-movementorchestral suite, providing that “mesmer-izing music” the play called for.

The score includes the following epi-graph from the play:

The world’s boundless ecstasybelongs to the heart that sings,

Anton RubinsteinBorn November 28, 1829, in Vikhvatinets, Ukraine

Died November 20, 1894, in Peterhof, Russia

Cello Concerto No. 2 in D minor, Op. 96Composed in 1874

Performance Time: Approximately 29 minutes

Instruments for this performance: 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 3 French horns, 2 trumpets, timpani, 22 violins, 8 violas, 8 cellos, 6 double

basses, and cello soloist

Anton Rubinstein, one of the most cel-ebrated pianist-composers of the 19thcentury and founder of the St. Peters-burg Conservatory, composed two celloconcertos for his colleague Karl Davydov,whom Tchaikovsky described as the“tsar of all cellists.” The first majorcomposer in Russia to write concertosfor any instrument, Rubinstein hadimportant European models to drawon, but he strove to �Russianize” thosemodels—something his more radicallynationalist contemporaries from the“Mighty Handful” gave him little creditfor. Yet several of the themes in the present

work are undeniably Russian in theirmelodic style, and the concerto consis-tently eschews the methods of thematicdevelopment that German composersfrom Beethoven to Brahms were sofond of using.

The concerto is an eminently melodicwork, in three movements played withoutpause. The first movement is serious andexpressive; the second, which beginswith a chorale-like introduction scoredfor woodwinds, is delicate and lyrical.Between the second and third movementsthe soloist plays a cadenza, punctuated by

the roaring ocean calls to a fatal and aimless wandering.

Surrender to the impossible dream,You will fulfill your fate,It is the heart’s immutable law:Joy and suffering are the same!(transl. P. L.)

Movement I (The Castle of Archim-bault at Dawn) opens with a dark motiffor low strings and clarinets, accompa-nied by dramatic tremolos; a gloomyidea that gradually rises in dynamics toreach fortissimo, only to sink back,suddenly, into the mysterious atmos-phere of the opening.

A brief fanfare for three muted trum-pets leads into Movement II (The Roomsof Isaure), a passionately romantic sketch

with a colorfully orchestrated, explo-sive melody.

Movement III (On the Ocean Shore)reprises the main motif of the firstmovement in a more dramatic presen-tation; it is followed without pause byMovement IV (Gaetan’s Song), in whichwe hear the song that is so important inthe play (and from which Krein tookthe above-quoted epigraph). The expres-sive melody, first heard on English horn,viola, and cello, is later taken over by theentire orchestra. Movement V (TheDeath of Bertrand: Epilog) opens as afuneral march that, however, segues intoa recapitulation of Gaetan’s Song fromthe previous movement, fashioned intothe work’s triumphant conclusion, rep-resenting the “boundless ecstasy of theheart that sings.”

Mikhail GnesinBorn February 2, 1883, in Rostov-on-Don, Russia

Died May 5, 1957, in Moscow

From Shelley (“Symphonic Fragment after Percy Bysshe Shelley’s PrometheusUnbound”), Op. 4

Composed in 1906–08Performance Time: Approximately 8 minutes

Instruments for this performance: 2 flutes, 1 piccolo, 2 oboes, 1 English horn, 3 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 1 contrabassoon, 5 French Horns, 2 trumpets, 3 trombones,

1 tuba, timpani, 2 harps, 22 violins, 8 violas, 8 cellos, and 6 double basses

orchestral interjections; this is followed bythe finale, a rondo based on a melodyclearly inspired by Russian folksong.

After a second cadenza the meter changesfrom duple and triple for a varied recapit-ulation of the main theme.

A generation before Samuel Barber wrotehis Music for a Scene from Shelley afterPrometheus Unbound, Mikhail Gnesinwas inspired by the same play for hisown “symphonic fragment.” Shelley wasparticularly admired by the poets of theRussian Silver Age; one of the leadingRussian poets of the time, KonstantinBalmont, translated the complete worksof the great English Romantic.

Gnesin studied with Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov around the same time thatStravinsky did, and they were rather goodfriends for a while. (The famous GnesinInstitute of Moscow bears the name ofthis eminent composer and his three sis-ters, all pianists.) Gnesin was one of thefounders of the Society for Jewish FolkMusic and later became known as the“Jewish Glinka” for his Jewish operas. Inhis book Music of the Repressed RussianAvant-garde, Larry Sitsky comparesGnesin to Krein: “In contrast to Krein,Gnesin was a much more cerebral com-poser, concerned with the inward-lookingand the contemplative rather than theexternal sensuality of his colleague.”

The present composition is Gnesin’sfirst orchestral score, written during his

years of study under Rimsky-Korsakov.On the front page we find the followingexcerpt from Prometheus Unbound inBalmont’s translation:

There was a change: the impalpablethin air

And the all-circling sunlight weretransformed,

As if the sense of love dissolved in themHad folded itself round the spherèdworld.

(Act III, scene 4)

A vision of light and sun then fills thepages of Gnesin’s short symphonicpoem, which develops a single briefmotif in rich orchestral colors, describ-ing a gradual crescendo and accelerandofollowed by a diminuendo and ritar-dando. It was all intended to pleaseRimsky-Korsakov but, as we may learnfrom the latter’s memoirs, the masterrealized that the young man was onlytrying to placate him by the simplicityof his music, and that the young gener-ation had begun to move in some newstylistic directions. Still, From Shelleywas an auspicious start for a composerwho went on to have a distinguishedcareer in Russia and the Soviet Union.

Maximilian SteinbergBorn July 4, 1883, in Vilnius, LithuaniaDied December 6, 1946, in Leningrad

Symphony No. 1 in D major, Op. 3Composed in 1905–06

Premiered March 18, 1908, in St. PetersburgPerformance Time: Approximately 40 minutes

Instruments for this performance: 2 flutes, 1 piccolo, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 1 contrabassoon, 5 French horns, 3 trumpets, 3 trombones, 1 tuba,timpani, percussion (triangle, cymbals, bass drum), 22 violins, 8 violas, 8 cellos,

and 6 double basses

Rimsky-Korsakov’s pupil and son-in-law,Stravinsky’s rival, and Shostakovich’steacher, Maximilian Steinberg was acentral figure in Russian musical lifebefore, during, and after the OctoberRevolution. Yet in spite of these illustri-ous associations, history has not beenkind to Steinberg, whose music is hardlyever heard today. Granted, he was noinnovator and never seemed to rock theboat in any way. Still, anyone who couldcompose a symphony like the one we'regoing to hear while still a student in hisearly 20s must be taken seriously: onecannot help but admire the young man’smastery of compositional technique—form, harmony, orchestration—as wellas the confidence with which hedeploys that technique. Concurrently tohis musical studies, Steinberg was alsoan aspiring scientist at the university,and he graduated with a gold medal inbiology in 1906.

The son of a distinguished Hebrewscholar from Vilna, the city that used tobe called the “Jerusalem of Lithuania,”Steinberg did not immediately adopt theRussian nationalist style of his teacherRimsky-Korsakov. His models in the FirstSymphony seem to be entirely Germanic,

with influences ranging from Beethovenand Schumann to Mendelssohn andWagner. The first movement opens witha pure D major that had become rare inthe first years of the new century; the6/8 time that the classics used so oftento evoke the hunt comes to new life inthis radiant Allegro non troppo. Thescherzo that follows bristles withenergy, with a gentle waltz for a triosection. In the slow movement a singlemelodic-rhythmic idea is exploitedthrough a succession of attractive windsolos. The dynamic Finale, completewith the obligatory fugato, also con-tains a slower episode offering a differ-ent take on the fugato theme. Justbefore the end we hear two sustained,mysterious chords providing a last-minute moment of suspense, followedby the powerful final chords.

The Symphony was dedicated toAleksandr Glazunov, another teacherof Steinberg’s, who became the directorof the St. Petersburg Conservatory in1905. It received its premiere in St.Petersburg on March 18, 1908.

Peter Laki is visiting associate professorof music at Bard College.

THE ArtistsLeon Botstein is now in his 24th year asmusic director and principal conductorof the American Symphony Orchestra.This season he also begins his tenure asthe music director of The OrchestraNow, an innovative training orchestracomposed of top musicians fromaround the world. Mr. Botstein hasbeen hailed for his visionary zeal, oftencreating concert programs that giveaudiences a once-in-a-lifetime chanceto hear live performances of works thatare ignored in the standard repertory,and inviting music lovers to listen intheir own way to create a personalexperience. At the same time, he bringshis distinctive style to core repertoryworks. He is also artistic director ofBard SummerScape and the Bard MusicFestival, which take place at theRichard B. Fisher Center for the Per-forming Arts at Bard College, where hehas been president since 1975. In addi-tion, he is conductor laureate of theJerusalem Symphony Orchestra, wherehe served as music director from2003–11.

Mr. Botstein leads an active schedule asa guest conductor all over the world,and can be heard on numerous record-ings with the London Symphony (includ-ing their Grammy-nominated recordingof Popov’s First Symphony), the Lon-don Philharmonic, NDR-Hamburg,and the Jerusalem Symphony Orches-tra. Many of his live performances withthe American Symphony Orchestra areavailable online, where they have cumu-latively sold more than a quarter of amillion downloads. Upcoming engage-ments include the Royal Philharmonic,

Wiesbaden, UNAM Mexico, and theSimon Bolivar Orchestra in Caracas.He recently conducted the RussianNational Orchestra, the Taipei Sym-phony, the Los Angeles Philharmonic,and the Sinfónica Juvenil de Caracas inVenezuela and Japan, the first non-Venezuelan conductor invited by El Sis-tema to conduct on a tour.

Highly regarded as a music historian,Mr. Botstein’s most recent book is VonBeethoven zu Berg: Das Gedächtnisder Moderne (2013). He is the editor ofThe Musical Quarterly and the authorof numerous articles and books. He iscurrently working on a sequel to Jeffer-son’s Children, about the American edu-cation system. Collections of his writingsand other resources may be found onlineat LeonBotsteinMusicRoom.com. Forhis contributions to music he hasreceived the award of the AmericanAcademy of Arts and Letters and Har-vard University’s prestigious CentennialAward, as well as the Cross of Honor,First Class from the government of

LEON BOTSTEIN, Conductor

RIC KALLAHER

Austria. Other recent awards include theCaroline P. and Charles W. Ireland Prize,the highest award given by the Univer-sity of Alabama; the Bruckner Society’sJulio Kilenyi Medal of Honor for hisinterpretations of that composer’s music;the Leonard Bernstein Award for theElevation of Music in Society; and

Carnegie Foundation’s Academic Lead-ership Award. In 2011 he was inductedinto the American Philosophical Society.

Mr. Botstein is represented worldwideby Susanna Stefani Caetani and in theUnited States by Columbia ArtistsManagement Inc.

István Várdai is the only cellist in theworld to have won both the Interna-tional Cello Competition in Geneva(2008) and the ARD Competition inMunich (2014), the two most impor-tant contests for cellists. In 2000 hewas elected best rising classical musi-cian in the world by Prix Montblanc.

Since Mr. Várdai’s debut concert in 1997at the Hague, he has performed in NewYork, London, Paris, Prague, Vienna,Frankfurt, Munich, Geneva, Dublin,Moscow, St. Petersburg, Florence, Tokyo,and Beijing. He is a regular guest at suchorchestras as the Russian NationalOrchestra, Mariinsky Theatre Orchestra,Suisse Romande, and the Bavarian RadioSymphony Orchestra, and festivals suchas the Santander, St. Petersburg, RadioFrance Montpellier, Verbier, West CorkFestival, Schwetzigen, and Casals Festival.

Mr. Várdai studied in the Class of Spe-cial Talents at the Liszt Academy inBudapest in 2004, and at the MusicAcademy of Vienna in 2005. Between2010 and 2013 he continued his studies atKronberg Academy in Germany, where hehas been on the staff since 2013.

Mr. Várdai plays a Montagnana cellofrom 1720.

ISTVÁN VÁRDAI, Cello

PILV

AX STUDIO

Now in its 54th season, the AmericanSymphony Orchestra was founded in1962 by Leopold Stokowski, with amission of making orchestral music acces-sible and affordable for everyone. MusicDirector Leon Botstein expanded thatmission when he joined the ASO in 1992,creating thematic concerts that exploremusic from the perspective of the visualarts, literature, religion, and history, and

reviving rarely-performed works thataudiences would otherwise never have achance to hear performed live.

The orchestra’s Vanguard Series con-sists of multiple concerts annually atCarnegie Hall. ASO also performs atthe Richard B. Fisher Center for thePerforming Arts at Bard College in Bard’sSummerScape Festival and the Bard

THE AMERICAN SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA

Music Festival. The orchestra has madeseveral tours of Asia and Europe, andhas performed in countless benefits fororganizations including the JerusalemFoundation and PBS.

Many of the world’s most accomplishedsoloists have performed with the ASO,including Yo-Yo Ma, Deborah Voigt,

and Sarah Chang. The orchestra hasreleased several recordings on theTelarc, New World, Bridge, Koch, andVanguard labels, and many live perfor-mances are also available for digitaldownload. In many cases these are theonly existing recordings of some of therare works that have been rediscoveredin ASO performances.

VIOLIN I Erica Kiesewetter,

ConcertmasterSuzanne GilmanYukie HandaDiane BruceRagga PetursdottirElizabeth NielsenAshley HorneDorothy StrahlAnn LabinRobert ZubryckiBrian KrinkeLaura Frautschi

VIOLIN II Richard Rood,

PrincipalSophia KessingerHeidi StubnerYana GoichmanLucy MorgansternElizabeth KleinmanWende NamkungAlexander VselenskyMargarita MilkisNazig Tchakarian

VIOLANardo Poy, PrincipalSally ShumwayCrystal GarnerRachel RiggsAdria BenjaminLouis DayAriel RudiakovArthur Dibble

CELLOEugene Moye,

PrincipalRoberta CooperAnnabelle HoffmanSarah CarterMaureen HynesDiane BarereRobert BurkhartTatyana Margulis

BASSJohn Beal, PrincipalJordan FrazierJack WengerLouis BrunoPeter DonovanRichard Ostrovsky

FLUTE Laura Conwesser,

PrincipalJulietta CurentonDiva Goodfriend-

Koven, Piccolo

OBOEKeisuke Ikuma,

PrincipalErin GustafsonMelanie Feld,

English Horn

CLARINET Laura Flax, PrincipalShari HoffmanLino Gomez, Bass

Clarinet

BASSOON Charles McCracken,

PrincipalMaureen StrengeGilbert Dejean,

Contrabassoon

HORNEric Reed, PrincipalSara CyrusDavid SmithKyle HoytDavid Peel, Assistant

TRUMPET Raymond Riccomini,

PrincipalJohn DentThomas Hoyt

TROMBONE Richard Clark,

PrincipalKenneth FinnJeffrey Caswell

TUBAKyle Turner,

Principal

TIMPANI Benjamin Herman,

Principal

PERCUSSION Javier Diaz, PrincipalMatthew BeaumontDavid Nyberg

HARPVictoria Drake,

PrincipalGrace Paradise

PERSONNELMANAGER

Patty Schmitt

ASSISTANTCONDUCTOR

ZacharySchwartzman

ORCHESTRALIBRARIAN

Marc Cerri

AMERICAN SYMPHONY ORCHESTRALeon Botstein, Conductor

Dimitri B. Papadimitriou, ChairThurmond Smithgall, Vice Chair

Miriam R. BergerMichael DorfRachel KalnickiJack KligerShirley A. Mueller, Esq.

Debra R. PemsteinEileen RhulenFelicitas S. Thorne

HONORARY MEMBERSJoel I. Berson, Esq.L. Stan Stokowski

ASO BOARD OF TRUSTEES

Lynne Meloccaro, Executive DirectorOliver Inteeworn, General ManagerBrian J. Heck, Director of MarketingNicole M. de Jesús, Director of DevelopmentSebastian Danila, Library ManagerCarley Gooley, Marketing AssistantCarissa Shockley, Operations Assistant

James Bagwell, Principal Guest ConductorZachary Schwartzman, Assistant ConductorRichard Wilson, Composer-In-ResidenceJames Bagwell, Artistic Consultant

ASO ADMINISTRATION

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Matching ProgramBernard AptekarJohn and Joanne BaerMarian D. BachThe Bank of America

Charitable FoundationReina BarcanCarol Kitzes BaronRuth BaronMary Ellin BarrettDr. Robert BasnerDavid C. Beek and Gayle

Christian Simone BeldaYvette and Maurice BendahanAdria BenjaminDaniel and Gisela BerksonStephen M. BrownMarjorie BurnsMoshe BursteinCA TechnologiesRichard C. CellerBarbara and Peter ClapmanTheodore and Alice Ginott

Cohn Philanthropic Fund Laura ConwesserHerbert and Mary DonovanPaul EhrlichRichard FarrisLynda FergusonMartha FerryLaura FlaxJeffrey F. FriedmanChristopher H. GibbsAnn and Lawrence GilmanJune O. GoldbergGordon GouldGreenwich House, Inc.Nathan GrossJohn L. HaggertyLaura HarrisEric S. HoltzPenelope HortHudson Guild, Inc. Sara HunsickerGeorge H. HutzlerJewish Communal FundJosé JiménezRonald S. KahnRobert and Susan KalishDr. Roses E. KatzRobert and Charlotte KellyDavid KernahanIrving and Rhoda KleimanCaral G. and Robert A. KleinDr. Carol LachmanShirley LeongLinda Lopez

William LublinerJoyce F. LuchtenbergAlan MallachElizabeth MateoCarolyn McColleyAlan B. McDougallSally and Bruce McMillenClifford S. MillerPhyllis and Stanley MishkinMartin L. and Lucy Miller

MurrayKenneth NassauMichael NasserKaren OlahClarence W. Olmstead, Jr.

and Kathleen F. HeenanRoger and Lorelle PhillipsDavid R. Pozorski and Anna

M. RomanskiWayne H. ReaganBonita RocheLeonard Rosen and Phyllis

RosenRochelle RubinsteinMichael T. RyanHenry SaltzmanPeter Lars Sandberg Albert SargentiSari Scheer and Samuel KopelNina C. and Emil SchellerSharon SchweidelGerald and Gloria ScorseMargret SellGeorgi ShimanovskyBruce Smith and Paul

CastellanoGertrude SteinbergHazel C. and Bernard StraussHelen StudleyRobert SweeneyMargot K. TalentiTart-Wald FoundationCatherine TraykovskiSusan and Charles TribbittMr. and Mrs. Jack UllmanJanet WhalenVictor WheelerDonald W. WhippleLarry A. WehrMichael P. A. WinnRichard J. WoodLeonard and Ellen ZablowAlfred ZollerMyra and Matthew

Zuckerbraun

FRIENDSAnonymous (4)Madelyn P. AshmanStephen BlumMona Yuter Brokaw

Mrs. A. Peter BrownRufus BrowningJoan BrunskillConnie ChenNancy L. ClipperRobert CohenConcerts MacMusicsonPatricia ContinoLois ConwayMichael and Frances CurranJudy Davis Thomas J. De StefanoSusanne DiamondRuth Dodziuk-Justitz and

Jozef DodziukBarton DominusRobert DurstJonathan F. DzikLee EvansAnne Stewart FitzroyExxonMobil FoundationDonald W. Fowle Helen GarciaBarbara GatesGoldman, Sachs & Co. Robert GottliebMichael and Ilene GottsMr. and Mrs. Sidney GreenbergJohn HallDonald HargreavesAndrée Hayum

John HelzerRobert HerbertGerald and Linda HerskowitzDiana F. HobsonChristopher HollingerCyma HorowitzDrs. Russell and Barbara

HolsteinTheresa JohnsonGinger KarrenPeter KeilKaori KitaoPete KlostermanFrederick R. KochSeymour and Harriet KoenigMr. and Mrs. Robert LaPorteDavid LaurensonPatricia LucaWalter LeviJudd LevyJosé A. LopezSarah LuhbyNancy LuptonDr. Karen ManchesterRichard and Maryanne

MendelsohnJohn Metcalfe Mark G. MiksicMyra MillerAlex MitchellMichael Nassar

Leonie NewmanSandra NovickJane and Charles PrussackBruce RaynorMartin RichmanCatherine RoachJohn W. RoaneDr. and Mrs. Arnold RosenJoe RuddickLeslie SalzmanHarriet SchonDr. and Mrs. Herbert C.

SchulbergThe Honorable Michael D.

StallmanPaul StumpfMadeline V. TaylorGretchen ViedermanRenata and Burt WeinsteinJon WetterauDavid A. WilkinsonAnn and Doug WilliamKurt WissbrunDagmar and Wayne YaddowLawrence YagodaMark and Gail Zarick

List current as of November 19, 2015

National Endowment for the ArtsJane Chu, Chairman

New York State Council on the Arts withthe support of Governor Andrew Cuomoand the New York State Legislature

The City of New YorkThe Honorable Bill De Blasio, MayorNYC Department of Cultural Affairs inpartnership with the New York CityCouncil

Music plays a special part in the lives of many New York residents. The American SymphonyOrchestra gratefully acknowledges the support of the following government agencies thathave made a difference in the culture of New York:

Since 1962 the American Symphony Orchestra has done something incredible: Present thewidest array of orchestral works, performed at exceptional levels of artistry—and offered atthe most accessible prices in New York City. Be they rare works or beloved masterpieces, noother orchestra dares to present the same depth of repertoire every single season.

But the ASO has urgent need of your support. Production costs for full-scale, orchestral con-certs are ever increasing, while public philanthropy for the arts has decreased at an alarm-ing rate. As always, we keep to our mission to maintain reasonable ticket prices, whichmeans ASO depends even more than most other orchestras on philanthropic contributions.

That’s why we must call on you—our audiences, artists, and community partners, who can-not imagine a world without opportunities to hear live Strauss, Muhly, Delius, or Reger.

Every dollar counts. Please donate at any level to safeguard the ASO’s distinctive program-ming now and ensure another season!

ANNUAL FUNDAnnual gifts support the Orchestra’s creative concert series and educational programs. Inappreciation, you will receive exclusive benefits that enhance your concert-going experienceand bring you closer to the Orchestra.

SUSTAINING GIFTSMake your annual gift last longer with monthly or quarterly installments. Sustaining giftsprovide the ASO with a dependable base of support and enable you to budget your giving.

MATCHING GIFTSMore than 15,000 companies match employees’ contributions to non-profit organizations.Contact your human resources department to see if your gift can be matched. Matching giftscan double or triple the impact of your contribution while you enjoy additional benefits.

CORPORATE SUPPORTHave your corporation underwrite an American Symphony Orchestra concert and enjoy themany benefits of the collaboration, including corporate visibility and brand recognition,employee discounts, and opportunities for client entertainment. We will be able to provideyou with individually tailored packages that will help you enhance your marketing efforts.For more information, please call 646.237.5022

HOW TO DONATEMake your gift online: www.americansymphony.org/support

Please make checks payable to: American Symphony Orchestra

Mail to:American Symphony Orchestra263 West 38th Street, 10th FloorNew York, NY 10018

For questions or additional information: Nicole M. de Jesús, Director of Development,646.237.5022 or ndejesus@americansymphony.org.

EXPAND OUR REPERTOIRE: SUPPORT THE ASO!

ASO’S 2016 SEASON AT CARNEGIE HALL

Thursday, March 17, 2016Giant in the Shadowswith Peter Serkin, pianoThe reputation of Max Reger today belies his dominantpresence in music during his lifetime and the legacy he left.Here we celebrate two of his works, and one by his friendand contemporary, Adolf Busch.Adolf Busch – Three Études for OrchestraMax Reger – Piano ConcertoMax Reger – Variations and Fugue on a Theme of J.A. Hiller

Tuesday, April 5, 2016A Mass of Lifewith the Bard Festival ChoraleDelius was a fervid follower of Nietzsche, and here he set pas-sages from the philosopher’s book Also sprach Zarathustra tomusic, creating a grand and compelling work celebratinglife at its highest.Frederick Delius – A Mass of Life

KATHY CHAPM

AN