July 10, 2018

Lincoln Center’s 2018 Mostly Mozart Festival

Lincoln Center News

Lincoln Center Announces Expanded Mostly Mozart Festival

July 12-August 12, 2018

 

Expansion of Festival to Feature International Roster of

Productions and Premieres across Disciplines, including:

• Available Light, the groundbreaking collaboration by choreographer Lucinda Childs, composer John Adams, and architect Frank Gehry in its first New York revival since its premiere three decades ago
• Haydn’s The Creation, in the North American premiere of a production by the radically inventive Catalan theater collective La Fura dels Baus
• A revival of the landmark production of Yukio Ninagawa’s Macbeth in its final staging
• A world premiere by Mark Morris set to Schubert’s Trout Quintet
• The world premiere of a Lincoln Center commission, In the Name of the Earth by John Luther Adams, for hundreds of voices in Central Park
• A celebration of the Bernstein Centennial with Leonard Bernstein’s MASS, in a new staging by Elkhanah Pulitzer in her New York debut, featuring the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra, led by Renée and Robert Belfer Music Director Louis Langrée, with baritone Nmon Ford
• The Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra performs eight programs with guest artists including Emanuel Ax, Joshua Bell, Thomas Dausgaard, and soprano Rosa Feola (New York debut), among many others
• New York premiere of Ashley Fure and Adam Fure’s installation opera The Force of Things: An Opera for Objects, to be performed in Brooklyn by the International Contemporary Ensemble
• A Little Night Music, a returning series of intimate, late-night performances; documentary film presentations, and special free events also featured

NEW YORK (March 5, 2018 / Updated July 30, 2018) — Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts today announced its 2018 Mostly Mozart Festival, which will run July 12 to August 12. This summer marks an expansion of the festival, as it significantly increases the size and scope of its multidisciplinary presentations, enhances its commitment to the music of our own time, and extends its geographical footprint to include Central Park and Brooklyn. While maintaining Mozart’s creative genius at its heart, the festival will magnify its artistic impact through landmark international productions in all disciplines and concerts by emerging creative voices, as well as commissions and world premieres. American Express is the lead sponsor of the Mostly Mozart Festival.

“What is most inspiring about Mozart is his unmatched capacity for invention and innovation,” said Jane Moss, Ehrenkranz Artistic Director. “Any festival that carries his name must exhibit an equally bold and adventurous commitment to ongoing growth and transformation. This summer we move into a new chapter of expansion. Mostly Mozart is certain to secure its place as a vibrant international arts festival, marked by its powerful artistic cross-pollination and ambitious, forward-thinking vision, plus a strong commitment to the unique energy and community that is New York City. Most important of all, it is a destination that reveals the most sublime expressions and dimensions of the human heart. I believe Mozart would approve.

Opening the 2018 season is Available Light, a trailblazing collaboration between choreographer Lucinda Childs, composer John Adams, and architect Frank Gehry, seen in New York for the first time in 33 years. The Catalonian theater collective La Fura dels Baus joins the esteemed period ensemble Insula Orchestra and accentus choir for the North American premiere of a wildly inventive staging of Haydn’s The Creation. The achingly beautiful NINAGAWA Macbeth, a revival of the original 1980 production from Japan—and the last production overseen by legendary director Yukio Ninagawa before his death in 2016—will be staged one last time before it is retired. Closing the season, the Mark Morris Dance Group returns to the festival with the world premiere of The Trout, set to Schubert’s quintet of the same name.

 

A chorus of hundreds of experienced and amateur singers will premiere John Luther Adams’s In the Name of the Earth in Central Park’s Harlem Meer. The performance builds on two highly acclaimed outdoor world premieres commissioned previously for the Mostly Mozart Festival: 2014’s Sila: The Breath of the World, also by John Luther Adams, and David Lang’s the public domain, which marked the 50th anniversary of the Mostly Mozart Festival in 2016. Simon Halsey, who led the performance of the public domain, returns to the festival to conduct In the Name of the Earth.

 

The Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra, led by Renée and Robert Belfer Music Director Louis Langrée, continues to provide the backbone of the festival’s season with its command of the works of Mozart, as well as repertoire spanning the Baroque to the contemporary. It opens with a new staging of the Bernstein MASS, commemorating the composer’s centennial year. This ambitious presentation, directed by Elkhanah Pulitzer (New York debut), brings together two choruses, the exciting baritone Nmon Ford, and a cast of dancers, vocalists, and musicians to David Geffen Hall. The orchestra will also be joined by acclaimed soloists and conductors throughout the season, including Emanuel Ax, Joshua Bell, Thomas Dausgaard, Rosa Feola (New York debut), Stephen Hough, Christian Zacharias, 16-year-old violin prodigy Daniel Lozakovich in his New York debut, and many more.

 

The intrepid International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), in its eighth year as festival artists-in-residence, will stage the New York premiere of Ashley Fure and Adam Fure’s immersive work The Force of Things: An Opera for Objects in the Gelsey Kirkland Arts Center in Brooklyn. The work, which premiered to wide acclaim in fall 2017, activates a space through installation, the vibrations of 24 subwoofers, and virtuosic performances by ICE musicians. The ensemble will present two additional programs: a free, nature-inspired concert in the David Rubenstein Atrium and a performance in the Gerald W. Lynch Theater built around inventive works for piano by three living American composers: John Adams, Courtney Bryan, and George Lewis.

 

The festival will continue its tradition of presenting celebrated artists and rising stars at venues on the Lincoln Center campus. The esteemed Emerson String Quartet joins forces with guest violist Nokuthula Ngwenyama for a program of Purcell, Bach, Mozart, and Mendelssohn at Alice Tully Hall. The popular A Little Night Music series of intimate late-night performances in the Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse continues with presentations by Emanuel Ax, Daniel Lozakovich and George Li, Pražák Quartet, Paul Lewis, and Stephen Hough and Imani Winds, among others. Complementing the festival programming, a film series will screen a documentary about Leonard Bernstein, various talks will delve further into the season’s themes, and pre-concert recitals will be presented prior to Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra programs.

 

“Under her visionary leadership, Jane Moss has grown the Mostly Mozart Festival into one of New York’s preeminent summer festivals—one that continually surprises, excites, and inspires both artists and audiences,” said Lincoln Center President Debora L. Spar. “In her first year overseeing all of Lincoln Center’s programming, she has assembled a breadth of world-class performances, while streamlining the organization’s artistic vision. The 2018 Mostly Mozart Festival sets a new standard for this beloved summer tradition and provides an auspicious groundwork for seasons ahead.”

 

“American Express is thrilled to support Lincoln Center’s Mostly Mozart Festival and its ambitious programming, bringing world class performances from across the arts to audiences in New York,” said Timothy J. McClimon, president, American Express Foundation. “This partnership is emblematic of our long- term commitment to the arts and Lincoln Center in ensuring that both remain vital to the culture of our hometown, New York City.”

 

Now in its 52nd year, the Mostly Mozart Festival is one of several summer programs offered by Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts that annually activate the campus’s indoor and outdoor spaces. Midsummer Night Swing (June 25–July 14) brings top bands from around the world, dance instructors, and New York’s social dance community to Damrosch Park for three weeks of dancing under the stars. Lincoln Center Out of Doors (July 25–August 12) presents a wide array of free performances, including film, music, dance, spoken word, film, and more, reflecting the diversity of New York City. The David Rubenstein Atrium’s robust calendar of free events, including world-class performances, illuminating conversations, dance parties, kids’ programs, and more, also continues through the summer.

 

Tickets for Friends of Mostly Mozart go on sale April 4 and to the general public beginning April 16. They can be purchased online at MostlyMozartFestival.org, by phone via CenterCharge at 212.721.6500, or by visiting the David Geffen Hall or Alice Tully Hall Box Offices.

 

STAGED PRODUCTIONS AND COMMISSIONS

Bios of artists are available on the Lincoln Center press site.

 

Available Light

Thursday, July 12 and Friday, July 13, 2018 at 7:30 pm

Rose Theater, Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Frederick P. Rose Hall

Lucinda Childs Dance Company (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

John Adams, music

Lucinda Childs, choreography

Frank Gehry, stage design

Beverly Emmons and John Torres, lighting design

Kasia Walicka Maimone, costume design

Mark Grey, sound design

 

This groundbreaking collaboration between composer John Adams, choreographer Lucinda Childs, and architect Frank Gehry returns to New York for the first time since 1983. Childs oversees this 2015 revival of the 20th-century masterpiece, in which nine dancers kaleidoscopically arrange and rearrange themselves within Gehry’s stark split-level set to Adams’s updated score Light Over Brass, a mesmerizing piece for synthesizer and recorded brass. Originally created for the opening of the converted warehouse now known as Geffen Contemporary at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, the work’s prismatic views of the relationship between dance, music, and architecture remain eminently relevant. The Mostly Mozart performances mark one of the last from the Lucinda Childs Dance Company's final season.

 

A pre-performance talk with Lucinda Childs will be held on Friday, July 13 at 6:15 pm at the Agnes Varis and Karl Leichtman Studio.

 

The revival of Available Light was commissioned by the Cal Performances, University of California, Berkeley; Festspielhaus St. Pölten; FringeArts, Philadelphia with the support of The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage; Glorya Kaufman Presents Dance at the Music Center and The Los Angeles Philharmonic Association; International Summer Festival Kampnagel, Hamburg; Onassis Cultural Centre—Athens; Tanz Im August, Berlin; and Théâtre de la Ville— Paris and Festival d’Automne à Paris.

Available Light was developed at MASS MoCa (Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art).

 

Produced by Pomegranate Arts.

 

The 2018 Mostly Mozart Festival presentation of Available Light is made possible in part by the LuEsther T. Mertz Charitable Trust.

 

Endowment support for the Mostly Mozart Festival presentation of Available Light is provided by Blavatnik Family Foundation Fund for Dance.

 

The Creation (North American production premiere)

Thursday, July 19 and Friday, July 20, 2018 at 7:30 pm

Rose Theater, Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Frederick P. Rose Hall

accentus, choir (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Insula Orchestra (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Laurence Equilbey, conductor (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

La Fura dels Baus—Carlus Padrissa, stage direction (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Christina Landshamer, Gabriel and Eve (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Robin Tritschler, Uriel (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Thomas Tatzl, Raphael and Adam (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Haydn: Die Schöpfung (“The Creation”)

 

The radically inventive Catalonian theater collective Fura dels Baus transforms Haydn’s Enlightenment-era oratorio into an immersive theatrical experience. Including visual pyrotechnics, three dozen large helium balloons, a 20-foot-tall crane, and a 250-gallon water tank, the work touches upon subjects from philosophy to genetics. Laurence Equilbey conducts Insula Orchestra, a period-instrument ensemble, along with three daring soloists and the accentus choir, who enact this musically and visually stunning portrayal of the emergence of life coupled with the continued presence of original sin.

 

Sung in German with English supertitles

 

NINAGAWA Macbeth

Saturday, July 21; Tuesday, July 24; and Wednesday, July 25, 2018 at 7:30 pm

Sunday, July 22, 2018 at 5:00 pm

David H. Koch Theater

By William Shakespeare

Translated by Yushi Odashima

Masachika Ichimura, Macbeth (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Yuko Tanaka, Lady Macbeth (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Yukio Ninagawa, director

 

Created in 1980, Yukio Ninagawa’s exquisitely striking cherry blossom—or sakura—Macbeth is a landmark among global theater productions. The painterly director, who died in 2016, transposed Shakespeare’s Scottish play to feudal Japan, where the title character is an honor-bound samurai, kabuki witches cast spells, and Buddhist chants alternate with works by Samuel Barber and Schubert. This revival of the original production, the last one overseen by Ninagawa before his death, stars Japanese actors Masachika Ichimura and Yuko Tanaka as Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, respectively. Lincoln Center will present the final staging of this beloved production before it is retired.

Performed in Japanese with English supertitles

 

The 2018 Mostly Mozart Festival presentation of NINGAWA Macbeth is made possible in part by the LuEsther T. Mertz Charitable Trust

 

The Force of Things: An Opera for Objects (New York premiere)

Monday, August 6–Wednesday, August 8, 2018 at 6:30 pm and 8:30 pm

Gelsey Kirkland Arts Center, Brooklyn

International Contemporary Ensemble

Ashley Fure, composer and co-director

Adam Fure, architectural design

César Alvarez, co-director

Lucy Dhegrae and Lisa E. Harris, voice

Ross Karre, percussion and producer

Levy Lorenzo, percussion and engineer

Nick Houfek, lighting

Lilleth Glimcher, associate director

Ashley Fure and Adam Fure: The Force of Things: An Opera for Objects

 

Composer Ashley Fure combines installation and live performance to create this immersive music-theater experience, which premiered at Peak Performances in 2017 to rave reviews. Collaborating with her architect brother Adam Fure and the International Contemporary Ensemble, she activates the Brooklyn space with 24 subwoofers vibrating at subsonic levels under a dense canopy of objects and materials to create an otherworldly soundscape in which seven live performers overlay a wordless drama.

 

American Premiere, Alexander Kasser Theater, Peak Performances @ Montclair State University (NJ). Co-produced by Peak Performances @ Montclair State University

 

Mark Morris Dance Group

Thursday, August 9–Saturday, August 11, 2018 at 7:30 pm

Sunday, August 12, 2018 at 5:00 pm

Rose Theater, Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Frederick P. Rose Hall

Mark Morris Dance Group Mark Morris, choreographer

Love Song Waltzes

Brahms: Liebeslieder-Walzer

Jennifer Zetlan (Mostly Mozart Festival debut), Luthien Brackett (Mostly Mozart Festival debut), Thomas Cooley, Thomas Meglioranza, vocalists

Colin Fowler, Amir Farid (Mostly Mozart Festival debut), piano

I Don’t Want to Love

Monteverdi: Madrigals

Jolle Greenleaf (Mostly Mozart Festival debut), Brian Giebler (Mostly Mozart Festival debut), James Kennerley, Thomas Meglioranza, vocalists

Colin Fowler, harpsichord; Hank Heijink, theorbo (Mostly Mozart Festival debut); Daniel Swenberg (Mostly Mozart Festival debut), lute/guitar; John Moran (Mostly Mozart Festival debut), cello

The Trout (World premiere)

Schubert: Piano Quintet in A major (“Trout”)

Inon Barnatan, piano; Ariel Quartet (Mostly Mozart Festival debut); Timothy Cobb, bass

 

The world premiere of The Trout, set to Schubert’s famous quintet, anchors this performance, which also illuminates music by Monteverdi and Brahms with Mark Morris’s buoyant and poetic choreography. The program includes three dances spanning nearly 30 years of Mark Morris's career, opening with two dances that explore the social intricacies of romance—1989’s Love Song Waltzes set to Brahms’s romantic Liebeslieder-Walzer for voice and piano four hands, and 1996’s I Don’t Want to Love, a revelatory exploration of some of Monteverdi’s most lovelorn madrigals. Acclaimed pianist Inon Barnatan and members of the distinguished Ariel Quartet join the Mark Morris Dance Group for the premiere of The Trout.

A pre-performance talk with Mark Morris and Benjamin D. Sosland will be held on Friday, August 10 at 6:15 pm at the Agnes Varis and Karl Leichtman Studio.

 

The 2018 Mostly Mozart Festival presentation of Mark Morris Dance Group is made possible in part by the LuEsther T. Mertz Charitable Trust

 

Endowment support for the Mostly Mozart Festival presentation of Mark Morris Dance Group is provided by Blavatnik Family Foundation Fund for Dance.

 

In the Name of the Earth (World Premiere)

Saturday, August 11, 2018 at 3:00 pm

Harlem Meer, Central Park

North, South, East, and West choruses

Simon Halsey, conductor

John Luther Adams: In the Name of the Earth (World Premiere)

Co-presented with Lincoln Center Out of Doors

Commissioned by Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts

Rain Location: The Cathedral of St. John the Divine

 

Continuing the tradition of presenting immersive, outdoor, musical experiences, Lincoln Center has commissioned John Luther Adams to create this monumental work for hundreds of voices. For In the Name of the Earth, Adams employs the sounds of indigenous names of geographical features across North America to weave together a sonic landscape honoring the earth, water, and wind. Simon Halsey leads this world premiere in a site-specific presentation at the northeast corner of Central Park. Both experienced and amateur singers will join for this one-time-only performance that is free and open to the public. In case of rain, the performance will take place at The Cathedral of St. John the Divine.

 

The 2018 Mostly Mozart Festival presentation of In the Name of the Earth is made possible in part by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and The Ford Foundation.

 

MOSTLY MOZART FESTIVAL ORCHESTRA

 

The cornerstone of the Mostly Mozart Festival are performances by its eponymous orchestra in David Geffen Hall, which has been transformed each summer since 2005, with its stage extended into the hall and audience seating added around the musicians. Under the leadership of Renée and Robert Belfer Music Director Louis Langrée, the Festival Orchestra has expanded its repertoire from the Classical period to include the Baroque era as well as the 20th and 21st centuries, performing works by composers such as David Lang, Magnus Lindberg, Osvaldo Golijov, and many others.

 

“The human message of Mozart’s music is timeless. His courage, imagination, vision, and incredible invention always speaks to the heart and shows an amazing balance between sensitivity and sensibility. This aspect inspires us both intellectually and creatively,” Langrée said. “As the Mostly Mozart Festival expands, the Orchestra continually looks to the model of Mozart to connect ideas across mediums, disciplines, and eras to allow us to go deeper into our own sensibilities and sensitivities.”

 

This season, the Festival Orchestra will present eight programs, opening with a special staged performance of the Bernstein MASS, directed by Elkhanah Pulitzer in her New York debut. Renowned soloists and conductors from around the world will be featured in additional programs. Most performances will be preceded by a half-hour recital at 6:30 pm.

 

Bernstein MASS (New York Production Premiere)

Tuesday, July 17 and Wednesday, July 18, 2018 at 7:30 pm

David Geffen Hall

Louis Langrée, conductor

Nmon Ford, Celebrant (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Elkhanah Pulitzer, director (New York debut)

Concert Chorale of New York

James Bagwell, choral director

Young People’s Chorus of New York City

Elizabeth Núñez, associate artistic director

Laurel Jenkins, choreographer

Seth Reiser, scenic and lighting designer

Christine Crook, costume designer

Mark Grey, sound designer 

Adam Larsen, projection designer

Bernstein MASS: A Theater Piece for Singers, Players and Dancers

 

Written for the 1971 inauguration of the Kennedy Center, the Bernstein MASS merges traditional liturgical form with contemporary theater, dance, jazz, and popular music, imbuing it with the social and political concerns of Vietnam War–era America. SF Opera Lab curator Elkhanah Pulitzer makes her New York debut directing this fully staged presentation, starring acclaimed baritone Nmon Ford, who sings the role of the morally conflicted Celebrant. Louis Langrée leads more than 200 performers, including the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra, the Concert Chorale of New York, the Young People’s Chorus of New York City, a marching band, and dancers in this monumental dramatic work with its eclectic score encompassing gospel, rock, showtunes, marches, and chorales.

With English supertitles.

 

A production of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Gustavo Dudamel, Music and Artistic Director

 

A pre-performance lecture with scholar Michael Beckerman will take place at 6:15 pm on Tuesday, July 17, and a pre-performance discussion with director Elkhanah Pulitzer will be at 6:15 pm on Wednesday, July 18. Both will be held at the Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse.

 

Jupiter Symphony

Friday, July 20 and Saturday, July 21, 2018 at 7:30 pm

Alice Tully Hall

Thomas Dausgaard, conductor

Francesco Piemontesi, piano

Mendelssohn: The Fair Melusina Overture

Mozart: Piano Concerto No. 27 in B-flat major, K.595

Symphony No. 41 in C major, K.551 (“Jupiter”)

Pre-concert recitals by Francesco Piemontesi at 6:30 pm

 

Thomas Dausgaard, who led a riveting performance of Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis with the Swedish Chamber Orchestra and Swedish Radio Choir as part of Lincoln Center’s White Light Festival last fall, returns to conduct a program featuring two of Mozart’s late masterpieces. Italian pianist Francesco Piemontesi, who will perform Brahms’s Three Intermezzos during pre-concert recitals prior to the performances, joins for Mozart’s final piano concerto, K.595, followed by the composer’s sublime last symphony, the “Jupiter.”

 

Americans in Paris

Tuesday, July 24 and Wednesday, July 25, 2018 at 7:30 pm

David Geffen Hall

Louis Langrée, conductor

Emanuel Ax, piano

Friedrich Heinrich Kern, glass harmonica (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Philipp Marguerre, glass harmonica

Jasmine Choi, flute

Max Blair, oboe

Shmuel Katz, viola

Ilya Finfelshteyn, cello

Bernstein: Overture to Candide

Mozart: Piano Concerto No. 17 in G major, K.453

Mozart: Adagio and Rondo in C minor for glass harmonica, flute, oboe, viola, and cello, K.617

Gershwin: An American in Paris (new critical edition, edited by Mark Clague)

Pre-concert recitals by Friedrich Heinrich Kern and Philipp Marguerre at 6:30 pm

 

The cross-Atlantic exchange of ideas between France and the U.S. serves as a theme for this program. Louis Langrée leads two American takes on Gallic culture with Bernstein’s Voltaire-inspired Overture to Candide and a new critical edition of Gershwin’s An American in Paris. Meanwhile, Mozart’s Adagio and Rondo in C minor makes great use of the glass harmonica, which was invented by Benjamin Franklin, the first United States ambassador to France, and will be played by specialists Friedrich Heinrich Kern and Philipp Marguerre, who will also join for pre-concert recitals at 6:30 pm in David Geffen Hall. Emanuel Ax, a frequent guest at the festival, performs Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 17, which, coincidently, was Bernstein’s favorite “party” piece.

 

Handel & Bach

Friday, July 27 and Saturday, July 28, 2018 at 7:30 pm

David Geffen Hall

Richard Egarr, conductor and harpsichord (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Jasmine Choi, flute

Ruggero Allifranchini, violin

Handel: Concerto Grosso in B-flat major, Op. 3, No. 2

Handel: Sonata a cinque in B-flat major

Handel: Selections from Water Music

Bach: Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 in D major

Bach: Orchestral Suite No. 3 in D major

Pre-concert recitals by guitarist Jiji at 6:30 pm

 

Conductor and harpsichordist Richard Egarr, who is also the music director of the Academy of Ancient Music, conducts masterpieces of the Baroque era from the keyboard, including Handel’s Water Music and Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 and Orchestral Suite No. 3. Jasmine Choi, principal flutist of the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra, and Ruggero Allifranchini, its concertmaster, are featured soloists.

 

Guitarist Jiji, first prize–winner at the 2016 Concert Artists Guild Competition, performs works by Albéniz, Marais, Bach, and Paganini in pre-concert recitals at David Geffen Hall at 6:30 pm.

 

Joshua Bell Plays Bruch

Tuesday, July 31 and Wednesday, August 1, 2018 at 7:30 pm

David Geffen Hall

Louis Langrée, conductor

Joshua Bell, violin

John Adams: Tromba lontana

Bruch: Violin Concerto No. 1 in G minor, Op. 26

Brahms: Symphony No. 2 in D major, Op. 73

Pre-concert recitals by violinist Stephen Waarts at 6:30 pm

 

Joshua Bell returns to the festival, performing a pearl of the violin repertoire: Bruch’s Violin Concerto No. 1, which was the first concerto the violinist recorded and released at the age of 19. The concerto bridges John Adams’s cleverly subdued fanfare, Tromba Iontana, and Brahms’s uplifting Symphony No. 2, which concludes the program.

 

Violinist Stephen Waarts, winner of the 2015 Queen Elizabeth Competition, performs Brahms’s Violin Sonata No. 3 in pre-concert recitals in David Geffen Hall at 6:30 pm.

 

Prague Symphony

Friday, August 3 and Saturday, August 4, 2018 at 7:30 pm

David Geffen Hall

Christian Zacharias, conductor and piano

Rosa Feola, soprano (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

All-Mozart program

Piano Concerto No. 25 in C major, K.503

Ch’io mi scordi di te…Non temer, amato bene, K505

Bella mia fiamma…Resta, o cara, K.528

Symphony No. 38 in D major, K.504 (“Prague”)

Pre-concert recitals with clarinetist Jon Manasse, violist Shmuel Katz, and pianist Drew Petersen at 6:30 pm

 

Written within a day of each other, Mozart’s Prague Symphony and his Piano Concerto No. 25 frame this program devoted to the composer. Christian Zacharias, an outstanding soloist and insightful conductor, leads Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 25 from the keyboard, before taking up the baton for the rest of the program. Building on the evening’s theme, rising Italian soprano Rosa Feola, in her New York debut, joins the orchestra in a pair of virtuosic arias inspired by the storied Czech soprano—and Mozart’s close friend—Josepha Dušek.

 

Members of the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra will perform pre-concert recitals in David Geffen Hall at 6:30 pm.

 

Beethoven’s First Symphony

Tuesday, August 7, and Wednesday, August 8, 2018 at 7:30 pm

David Geffen Hall

Louis Langrée, conductor Daniel Lozakovich, violin

John Adams: The Chairman Dances

Mozart: Violin Concerto No. 3 in G major, K.216

Beethoven: Symphony No. 1 in C major, Op. 21

Pre-concert recitals by pianist Dominic Cheli at 6:30 pm

 

Sixteen-year-old Swedish-born violin prodigy Daniel Lozakovich joins the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra in Mozart’s Violin Concerto No. 3, which the composer wrote when he was 19. The program is bookended by two works offering glimpses of artistic potential: John Adams’s The Chairman Dances, an “outtake” that paved the way for his opera Nixon in China, and Beethoven’s First Symphony. Pianist Dominic Cheli, first-prize winner of the 2017 Concert Artists Guild Competition, will perform Brahms’s Rhapsody in E-flat Major and Lizst’s Réminiscences de Don Juan during pre-concert recitals at 6:30pm in David Geffen Hall.

 

Mozart Requiem

Friday, August 10 and Saturday, August 11, 2018 at 7:30 pm

David Geffen Hall

Louis Langrée, conductor

Stephen Hough, piano

Jodie Devos, soprano (U.S. debut)

Jennifer Johnson Cano, mezzo-soprano

Andrew Stenson, tenor (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Ryan Speedo Green, bass-baritone (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Concert Chorale of New York

James Bagwell, choral director

All-Mozart program

Meistermusik (“Replevit me amaritudinibus”), K. deest

Piano Concerto No. 21 in C major, K.467

Requiem, K.626

 

A transcendent summer finale brings together the dirges of Mozart’s Meistermusik with the spiritual ascension of his Requiem. Louis Langrée and the Festival Orchestra are joined by four acclaimed singers and the Concert Chorale of New York for Mozart’s final masterpiece. Pianist Stephen Hough brings his intellect and technical brilliance to one of the composer’s most beloved piano concertos, No. 21, famously known as “Elvira Madigan.”

 

FEATURED CHAMBER ENSEMBLES

 

Emerson String Quartet

Monday, July 30, 2018 at 7:30 pm

Alice Tully Hall

Nokuthula Ngwenyama, guest viola (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Purcell: Fantasia upon one note, for Five Viols in F major, Z. 745

Bach (arr. Förster): Fugue in D minor, BWV 849, from the Well-Tempered Clavier, Book I

Mozart: String Quintet in G minor, K.516

Mendelssohn: Quintet No. 2 in B-flat major, Op. 87

Pre-concert recital by the Emerson String Quartet at 6:30 pm

 

Spanning three centuries of chamber music repertoire, this program by the Emerson String Quartet and guest violist Nokuthula Ngwenyama in her festival debut is organized chronologically. It begins with one of Purcell’s Fantasias, which the Emerson Quartet explored in its 2017 album Chaconnes and Fantasias: Music of Britten and Purcell. Works by Bach, Mozart, and Mendelssohn showcase the ensemble’s virtuosity, from the finely wrought Baroque selections to Mozart’s restless Quintet in G Minor and Mendelssohn’s romantic late-period Quintet No. 2.

 

The Emerson String Quartet performs Haydn’s Quartet in D major, Op. 50, No. 6 (“The Frog”) in a pre-concert recital in Alice Tully Hall at 6:30 pm.

 

International Contemporary Ensemble: Grand Pianola Music

Thursday, August 2, 2018 at 7:30pm

Gerald W. Lynch Theater

International Contemporary Ensemble

Christian Reif, conductor (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Cory Smythe, piano

Jacob Greenberg, piano

Peter Evans, trumpet

Joshua Rubin, clarinet

Ryan Muncy, saxophone

Courtney Bryan: Songs of Laughing, Smiling, and Crying (2012)

George Lewis: Voyager (1987/2018)

John Adams: Grand Pianola Music (1982)

 

The piano in various forms is central to this program, conjured up by ICE’s ever-inventive musicians. In Courtney Brown’s Songs of Laughing, Smiling, and Crying, it converses with eclectic recordings plucked from YouTube. In a newly revised version of George Lewis’s epic chamber piece Voyager, artificial intelligence technology allows the piano to take up the conversation on its own, a sentient automaton among human wind players. And in John Adams’s groundbreaking 1982 work Grand Pianola Music, for two pianos, voices, and chamber ensemble, humans return with superhuman skills, re-creating tape-delayed loops to astonishing effect.

 

Yamaha Disklavier concert grand pianos provided by Yamaha Artist Services, New York

 

International Contemporary Ensemble: A wave and waves

Thursday, August 9, 2018 at 7:30 

David Rubenstein Atrium

International Contemporary Ensemble Michael Pisaro: a wave and waves

Free; Seating is available on a first-come, first-served basis.

 

Michael Pisaro’s 70-minute deep listening experience a wave and waves embeds audience members within a slowly emerging ocean of sound created by 100 performers. Isolated, imperceptibly soft noises—sandpaper on stone, seeds falling on glass, bowed bells—are layered into powerful waves of sound with reactive lighting adding to the immersive nature of the experience. A work of monumental scale and uncommon immediacy, a wave and waves melds microscopic moments of friction, gravity, and vibration into a single, pulsing organism. This program is a collaboration between ICE, Walden School’s Young Musicians Program, and Usdan Summer Camp for the Arts as part of the OpenICE initiative.

 

A LITTLE NIGHT MUSIC

 

The inaugural season of the Mostly Mozart Festival, in 1966, featured special Mozart at Midnight events. The concept was re-imagined in 2004 as A Little Night Music. These popular late-night recitals present intimate concerts with candlelit tables, complimentary wine, and sparkling skyline views in the Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse in Lincoln Center’s Rose Building.

 

Emanuel Ax, piano

Friedrich Heinrich Kern, glass harmonica

Philipp Marguerre, glass harmonica

Wednesday, July 25 at 10:00 pm

Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse

Debussy: Pagodes from Estampes

Haydn: Adagio

Piazzolla: Tanti Anni Prima

Gershwin: Summertime

Mozart: Sonata in F major, K.533

Mozart: Ave verum corpus, K. 618

 

A frequent guest of the Mostly Mozart Festival, Emanuel Ax supplements his July 24 and 25 appearances with the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra with a special, intimate performance expanding on the exchange of ideas between France and the United States. Glass harmonica specialists Friedrich Heinrich Kern and Philipp Marguerre, who are also featured soloists in the Festival Orchestra program, joins Ax for this illuminating evening.

 

Virtuoso Vivaldi

Helicon Ensemble

Avi Stein, artistic director

Saturday, July 28 at 10:00 pm

Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse

Vivaldi: Concerto in D major, from L'estro armonica, Op. 3, No. 1

Durante: Concerto No. 2 in G minor

Vivaldi: Trio Sonata in D minor, Op. 1, No. 12 ("Follia")

Brescianello: Chaconne in A major

Vivaldi: Concerto in A minor, from L'estro armonico, Op. 3, No. 8

 

Lauded for its novel and imaginative chamber music performances presented within a historical context, the Helicon Ensemble turns its innovative eye to the work of Vivaldi and his contemporaries. Under the leadership of Avi Stein, who has served as artistic director since 2013, the ensemble carries on the legacy of founder Albert Fuller, who sought to further the understanding of music’s role in our culture.

 

Daniel Lozakovich, violin (New York debut)

George Li, piano (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Wednesday, August 1 at 10:00 pm

Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse

Bach: Chaconne, from Partita No. 2 in D minor, BWV 1004

Beethoven: Sonata No. 6 in F major, Op.10, No. 2

Mozart: Sonata in B-flat major for violin and piano, K.378

 

A pair of thrilling young musicians, 16-year-old violinist Daniel Lozakovich and 2016 Avery Fisher Career Grant winner George Li, make their New York and Mostly Mozart Festival debuts, respectively, in an electrifying program.

 

Pražák Quartet

Friday, August 3, 2018 at 10:00 pm

Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse

Dušek: String Quartet in A major (U.S. Premiere)

Mozart (arr. Joseph Kueffner): Arias from Don Giovanni

Mozart: String Quartet in D major, K.499 (“Hoffmeister”)

 

Founded in 1972 at the Prague Conservatory, the Pražák Quartet has been at home on music stages worldwide for more than thirty years. For this special performance, the ensemble juxtaposes works by Mozart with the U.S. premiere of the String Quartet in A major by Czech composer František Xaver Dušek, whose wife, soprano Josepha Dušek, who performed one of the arias by Mozart featured on the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra program earlier in the evening.

 

Paul Lewis, piano

Saturday, August 4, 2018 at 10:00 pm

Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse

All-Haydn program:

Sonata in B minor, Hob. XVI:32

Sonata in E-flat major, Hob XVI:49

Sonata in G major, Hob. XVI:40

 

Internationally regarded as a leading musician of his generation, Paul Lewis is one of the world’s foremost interpreters of the central European Classical-period repertoire. Having already completed cycles of core piano works by Beethoven and Schubert, Lewis turns his attention to another titan of the era: Haydn.

 

New York Festival of Song

Lyrics by Shakespeare

Wednesday, August 8, 2018 at 10:00 pm

Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse

Steven Blier, pianist, host, and arranger (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Naomi Louisa O'Connell, mezzo-soprano (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Matt Boehler, bass (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Kathleen Chalfant, reader (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Dankworth: If music be the food of love

Dick Hyman: Who is Sylvia?

Vaughan Williams: Orpheus with his lute

Finzi: It was a lover and his lass

Quilter: Blow, blow, thou winter wind

Poulenc: Fancy

Berlioz: La mort d'Ophélie

Kabalevsky: Sonnet No. 13 ("O that you were yourself!"), Sonnet 153 ("Cupid laid by his brand and fell asleep")

Thompson: Sigh no more, ladies

Stephen Sondheim: Fear no more

Dankworth: Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?, Dunsinane Blues

 

In their first appearance at the Mostly Mozart Festival, the New York Festival of Song and its Artistic Director Steven Blier explore the breadth of influence and inspiration of Shakespeare’s words on composers from diverse cultures and eras. Naomi Louisa O’Connell and Matt Boehler, two exciting young singers, join Obie Award– winning actor Kathleen Chalfant in celebrating the musical legacy of the Bard.

 

Stephen Hough, piano

Imani Winds (Mostly Mozart Festival debut)

Friday, August 10, 2018 at 10:00 pm

Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse

Debussy: Clair de lune

Mozart: Quintet in E-flat major for piano and winds, K.452

Poulenc: Sextet for piano and winds

 

An exceptionally insightful concert pianist, as well as a writer and composer, Stephen Hough is joined by acclaimed woodwind quintet Imani Winds. Opening with Debussy’s beloved Clair de lune, marking the 100th anniversary of the composer’s death, the program then juxtaposes Mozart’s beloved chamber composition for piano and woodwinds with one written by Poulenc nearly 150 years later.

 

FILMS AND PANELS

 

FILM: Leonard Bernstein: The Gift of Music

Sunday, July 15, 2018 at 1:00 pm

Walter Reade Theater

Dir. Horant H. Hohlfeld (1993)

Narrated by Lauren Bacall

90 minutes

 

Containing rare footage of the conductor, composer, and educator, Leonard Bernstein: The Gift of Music surveys the extraordinary life and monumental career of one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century. This screening is presented in celebration of the centennial of Bernstein’s birth and in conjunction with the performance of his MASS at David Geffen Hall on July 17 and 18.

 

Panel Discussion: Mozart the Maverick

Sunday, July 29 at 3:00 pm

Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse

Free; Seating is available on a first-come, first-served basis.

 

Some of the world’s foremost Mozart experts present an illuminating, 90-minute conversation about how Mozart defied the status quo and forged his own path.

 

Presented in association with the Mozart Society of America.

 

Composers’ Forum

Thursday, August 2, 2018 at 6:00 pm

Bruno Walter Auditorium

John Schaefer, moderator

Free; Seating is available on a first-come, first-served basis.

 

Four diverse composers—Courtney Bryan, Ashley Fure, George Lewis, and Michael Pisaro—whose works will be performed during the Mostly Mozart Festival, join members of the International Contemporary Ensemble for a discussion of the creative process. Together, they will offer insights into their compositions, illuminating visions for the future of classical music.

 

Presented in association with the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts

 

Discussion: In the Name of the Earth

John Luther Adams and Simon Halsey in conversation with John Schaefer

Tuesday, August 7, 2018 at 6:15 pm

Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse

Free; Seating is available on a first-come, first-served basis.

 

Pulitzer Prize-winning composer John Luther Adams and esteemed conductor Simon Halsey join WNYC’s John Schaefer to discuss the world premiere of In the Name of the Earth, Adams’s choral work for 800 singers that was commissioned by Lincoln Center and will be performed under the baton of Halsey in Central Park on August 11.

 

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The Mostly Mozart Festival is a presentation of Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts (LCPA), which serves three primary roles: presenter of artistic programming, national leader in arts and education and community engagement, and manager of the Lincoln Center campus. A presenter of more than 3,000 free and ticketed events, performances, tours, and educational activities annually, LCPA offers a variety of festivals and programs, including American Songbook, Avery Fisher Career Grants and Artist program, David Rubenstein Atrium programming, Great Performers, Lincoln Center Emerging Artist Awards, Lincoln Center Out of Doors, Lincoln Center Vera List Art Project, LC Kids, Midsummer Night Swing, Mostly Mozart Festival, White Light Festival, the Emmy Award–winning Live From Lincoln Center, which airs nationally on PBS, and Lincoln Center Education, which is celebrating more than four decades enriching the lives of students, educators, and lifelong learners. As manager of the Lincoln Center campus, LCPA provides support and services for the Lincoln Center complex and the 11 resident organizations: The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Film Society of Lincoln Center, Jazz at Lincoln Center, The Juilliard School, Lincoln Center Theater, The Metropolitan Opera, New York City Ballet, New York Philharmonic, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, School of American Ballet, and Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts.

 

Lincoln Center has become a leading force in using new media and technology to reach and inspire a wider and global audience. Reaching audiences where they are—physically and digitally—has become a cornerstone of making the performing arts more accessible to New Yorkers and beyond. For more information, visit LincolnCenter.org.

 

Lincoln Center is committed to providing and improving accessibility for people with disabilities. For information, contact Accessibility at Lincoln Center at [email protected] or 212.875.5375.

 

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American Express is the Lead Sponsor of the Mostly Mozart Festival.

 

Endowment support is provided by the Blavatnik Family Foundation Fund for Dance.

 

The Mostly Mozart Festival is also made possible by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, The Ford Foundation, and Rita E. and Gustave M. Hauser. Additional support is provided by The Shubert Foundation, LuEsther T. Mertz Charitable Trust, The Howard Gilman Foundation, The Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels

Foundation, Inc., The Katzenberger Foundation, Inc., Great Performers Circle, Chairman’s Council, Friends of Mostly Mozart, and Friends of Lincoln Center

 

American Airlines is the Official Airline of Lincoln Center

Nespresso is the Official Coffee of Lincoln Center

NewYork-Presbyterian is the Official Hospital of Lincoln Center

Artist Catering provided by Zabar’s and Zabars.com

 

FOLLOW LINCOLN CENTER ON SOCIAL MEDIA:

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Twitter: @LincolnCenter #MostlyMozart

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For more information, please contact:

Isabel Sinistore  

[email protected]

212-671-4195

 

Julia Kirchhausen  

[email protected]

212-875-5049

Documents

• 2018 Mostly Mozart Festival Bios [PDF]
• Lincoln Center's 2018 Mostly Mozart Festival [PDF]

Web Links

• 2018 Mostly Mozart Festival trailer

High Resolution Images