ANDRIS NELSONS LEADS THE BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA IN THREE PROGRAMS AT CARNEGIE HALL OCTOBER 20, 21, AND 22, 2015, AS DETAILED IN CARNEGIE HALL’S 2015-16 SEASON ANNOUNCEMENT

January 28, 2015

ANDRIS NELSONS LEADS THE BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA IN THREE PROGRAMS AT CARNEGIE HALL OCTOBER 20, 21, AND 22, 2015, AS DETAILED IN CARNEGIE HALL’S 2015-16 SEASON ANNOUNCEMENT

ANDRIS NELSONS’ PROGRAMS WITH THE BSO AT CARNEGIE HALL IN FALL 2015 INCLUDE THE NEW YORK PREMIERE OF SEBASTIAN CURRIER’S DIVISIONS, BEETHOVEN’S PIANO CONCERTO NO. 3 WITH PAUL LEWIS, AND BRAHMS’S SYMPHONY NO. 2, OCTOBER 20; A CONCERT PERFORMANCE OF STRAUSS’S ELEKTRA, OCTOBER 21; AND RACHMANINOFF’S SYMPHONIC DANCES AND PROKOFIEV’S ALEXANDER NEVSKY WITH MEZZO-SOPRANO NADEZHDA SERDYUK, OCTOBER 22

ANDRIS NELSONS ALSO LEADS THESE PROGRAMS DURING THE BSO’S 2015-16 SEASON AT SYMPHONY HALL; MR. NELSONS AND THE BSO WILL ANNOUNCE COMPLETE DETAILS OF THE 2015-16 BSO SEASON IN LATE MARCH

As part of Carnegie Hall’s 2015-16 season, announced on January 28, BSO Music Director Andris Nelsons and the Boston Symphony Orchestra will perform three concerts, October 20, 21, and 22, 2015. The BSO programs to be performed at Carnegie Hall in the 2015-16 season will also be featured in the BSO’s 2015-16 season at Symphony Hall in Boston.  Mr. Nelsons and the BSO will announce complete details of the 2015-16 BSO season in late March.   Mr. Nelsons is currently in his first year as Music Director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

OCTOBER 20: PIANIST PAUL LEWIS JOINS ANDRIS NELSONS AND THE BSO FOR BEETHOVEN’S PIANO CONCERTO NO. 3 ON A PROGRAM INCLUDING BRAHMS’S SYMPHONY NO. 2 AND THE NEW YORK PREMIERE OF CURRIER’S DIVISIONS
Andris Nelsons and the Boston Symphony Orchestra are joined by pianist Paul Lewis for the opening concert of their three-night engagement at Carnegie Hall, Tuesday, October 20. Mr. Lewis joins the orchestra for Beethoven’s dramatic and tumultuous Third Piano Concerto. The program opens with the New York premiere of Sebastian Currier’s Divisions, a BSO co-commission, and closes with Brahms’s energetic and lyrical Symphony No. 2, written by the composer in a single summer in 1877.

OCTOBER 21: MAESTRO NELSONS LEADS THE ORCHESTRA IN A CONCERT PERFORMANCE OF STRAUSS’S ELEKTRA
On Wednesday, October 21, Andris Nelsons leads a concert performance of Strauss’s tragic one act opera, Elektra, featuring soprano Christine Goerke in the title role. The performance will also feature soprano Gun-Brit Barkmin (Chrysothemis), mezzo-soprano Jane Henschel (Klytämnestra), tenor Gerhard Siegel (Aegisth), and baritone James Rutherford (Orest). The opera, written with librettist Hugo von Hofmannsthal, centers on the murder of Elektra’s father, Agamemnon, and Elektra’s obsessive quest for revenge against his murderer, her mother, Klytämnestra.
OCTOBER 22: RUSSIAN MEZZO-SOPRANO NADEZHDA SERDYUK JOINS MAESTRO NELSONS AND THE ORCHESTRA FOR PROKOFIEV’S ALEXANDER NEVSKY ON A PROGRAM INCLUDING RACHMANINOFF’S SYMPHONIC DANCES
Concluding up the BSO’s 2015-16 Carnegie Hall programs, Russian mezzo-soprano Nadezhda Serdyuk joins Maestro Nelsons, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and the Tanglewood Festival Chorus for Prokofiev’s Alexander Nevsky Cantata, assembled from music originally written for Sergei Eisenstein’s nationalistic film about the 13th-century Russian prince. Maestro Nelsons closes the program with Rachmaninoff’s colorful and energetic Symphonic Dances, his final work and a summing-up of his compositional output, written in New York in exile but full of nostalgia for the old Russia.

ANDRIS NELSONS BIO
Andris Nelsons begins his tenure as the BSO’s Ray and Maria Stata Music Director with the 2014-15 season, during which he leads the orchestra in ten programs at Symphony Hall, repeating three of them at New York’s Carnegie Hall in April. Mr. Nelsons made his Boston Symphony debut in March 2011, conducting Mahler’s Symphony No. 9 at Carnegie Hall. He made his Tanglewood debut in July 2012, leading both the BSO and the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra as part of Tanglewood’s 75th Anniversary Gala (a concert subsequently issued on DVD and Blu-ray, and broadcast nationwide on PBS), following that the next day with a BSO program of Stravinsky and Brahms. His Symphony Hall and BSO subscription series debut followed in January 2013, and at Tanglewood in 2014 he led three concerts with the BSO, as well as a special Tanglewood Gala featuring both the BSO and the TMC Orchestra. His appointment as the BSO’s music director cements his reputation as one of the most renowned conductors on the international scene today, a distinguished name on both the opera and concert podiums. He made his first appearances as the BSO’s music director designate in October 2013 with a subscription program of Wagner, Mozart, and Brahms, and returned to Symphony Hall in March 2014 for a concert performance of Strauss’s Salome. He is the fifteenth music director in the history of the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

Maestro Nelsons has been critically acclaimed as music director of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra since assuming that post in 2008; he remains at the helm of that orchestra until summer 2015. With the CBSO he undertakes major tours worldwide, including regular appearances at such summer festivals as the Lucerne Festival, BBC Proms, and Berlin Festival. Together they have toured the major European concert halls, including Vienna’s Musikverein, the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris, the Gasteig in Munich, and Madrid’s Auditorio Nacional de Música. Mr. Nelsons made his debut in Japan on tour with the Vienna Philharmonic and returned to tour Japan and the Far East with the CBSO in November 2013. Over the next few seasons he will continue collaborations with the Berlin Philharmonic, Vienna Philharmonic, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam, the Gewandhaus Orchestra of Leipzig, the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, and the Philharmonia Orchestra. He is a regular guest at the Royal Opera House–Covent Garden, the Vienna State Opera, and New York’s Metropolitan Opera. In summer 2014 he returned to the Bayreuth Festival to conduct Lohengrin, in a production directed by Hans Neuenfels, which Mr. Nelsons premiered at Bayreuth in 2010.

Andris Nelsons and the CBSO continue their recording collaboration with Orfeo International as they work toward releasing all of Tchaikovsky’s orchestral works and a majority of works by Richard Strauss, including a particularly acclaimed account of Strauss’s Ein Heldenleben. Most of Mr. Nelsons’ recordings have been recognized with the Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik. In October 2011 he received the prestigious ECHO Klassik of the German Phono Academy in the category “Conductor of the Year” for his CBSO recording of Stravinsky’s Firebird and Symphony of Psalms. For audiovisual recordings, he has an exclusive agreement with Unitel GmbH, the most recent release being a Dvořák disc entitled “From the New World” with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, released on DVD and Blu-ray in June 2013. He is also the subject of a recent DVD from Orfeo, a documentary film entitled “Andris Nelsons: Genius on Fire.”

Born in Riga in 1978 into a family of musicians, Andris Nelsons began his career as a trumpeter in the Latvian National Opera Orchestra before studying conducting. He was principal conductor of Nordwestdeutsche Philharmonie in Herford, Germany, from 2006 to 2009 and music director of Latvian National Opera from 2003 to 2007.

A Brief History of the Boston Symphony Orchestra
Now in its 134th season, the Boston Symphony Orchestra gave its inaugural concert in 1881, realizing the dream of its founder, the Civil War veteran/businessman/ philanthropist Henry Lee Higginson, who envisioned a great and permanent orchestra in his hometown of Boston. In 2014, the orchestra will continue to build upon its storied history with the beginning of a new chapter as Andris Nelsons becomes the orchestra’s 15th music director at the start of the BSO’s 2014-15 season.

Today the BSO reaches millions of listeners, not only through its concert performances in Boston and at Tanglewood, but also via the internet, radio, television, educational programs, recordings, and tours. It commissions works from today’s most important composers; its summer season at Tanglewood in the Berkshire hills of Western Massachusetts is among the world’s most important music festivals; it helps develop future audiences through BSO Youth Concerts and educational outreach programs involving the entire Boston community; and, during the Tanglewood season, it operates the Tanglewood Music Center, one of the world’s most important training grounds for young professional-caliber musicians. The Boston Symphony Chamber Players, made up of BSO principals, are known worldwide, and the Boston Pops Orchestra—with its cabaret style festive atmosphere and food and drink served during the concerts—setsan international standard for performances of lighter music. The BSO’s winter season and the Boston Pops holiday and spring seasons take place in Boston’s Symphony Hall, widely acclaimed for its great acoustics and considered among the top concert halls in the world.

Launched in 1996, the BSO’s website, bso.org, is the largest and most-visited orchestral website in the United States, receiving approximately 7 million visitors annually on its full site as well as its smart phone-/mobile device-friendly web format. The BSO is also on Facebook and Twitter, and video content from the BSO is available on YouTube. An expansion of the BSO’s educational activities has also played a key role in strengthening the orchestra’s commitment to, and presence within, its surrounding communities. Through its Education and Community Engagement programs, the BSO provides individuals of all backgrounds the opportunity to develop and build relationships with the BSO and orchestral music. In addition, the BSO offers a variety of free educational programs at Symphony Hall and Tanglewood, as well as special initiatives aimed at attracting young audience members.

The Boston Symphony Orchestra gave its inaugural concert on October 22, 1881, under Georg Henschel, who remained as conductor until 1884. For nearly twenty years, BSO concerts were held in the old Boston Music Hall; Symphony Hall, one of the world’s most revered concert halls, opened on October 15, 1900. Henschel was succeeded by the German-born and -trained conductors Wilhelm Gericke, Arthur Nikisch, Emil Paur,and Max Fiedler, culminating in the appointment of the legendary Karl Muck, who served two tenures, 1906-08 and 1912-18. In 1915 the orchestra made its first transcontinental trip, playing thirteen concerts at the Panama-Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco. Henri Rabaud, engaged as conductor in 1918, was succeeded a year later by Pierre Monteux. These appointments marked the beginning of a French tradition maintained, even during the Russian-born Serge Koussevitzky’s tenure (1924-49), with the employment of many French-trained musicians.

It was in 1936 that Koussevitzky led the orchestra’s first concerts in the Berkshires; he and the players took up annual summer residence at Tanglewood a year later. Koussevitzky passionately shared Major Higginson’s dream of “a good honest school for musicians,” and in 1940 that dream was realized with the founding of the Berkshire Music Center (now called the Tanglewood Music Center).

Koussevitzky was succeeded in 1949 by Charles Munch, who continued supporting contemporary composers, introduced much French music to the repertoire, and led the BSO on its first international tours. In 1956, the BSO, under the direction of Charles Munch, was the first American orchestra to tour the Soviet Union. Erich Leinsdorf began his term as music director in 1962, to be followed in 1969 by William Steinberg. Seiji Ozawa became the BSO’s thirteenth music director in 1973. His historic twenty-nine-year tenure extended until 2002, when he was named Music Director Laureate. In 1979, the BSO, under the direction of Seiji Ozawa, was the first American orchestra to tour mainland China after the normalization of relations.

Bernard Haitink, named principal guest conductor in 1995 and Conductor Emeritus in 2004, has led the BSO in Boston, New York, at Tanglewood, and on tour in Europe, as well as recording with the orchestra. Previous principal guest conductors of the orchestra included Michael Tilson Thomas, from 1972 to 1974, and the late Sir Colin Davis, from 1972 to 1984.

The first American-born conductor to hold the position, James Levine was the BSO’s music director from 2004 to 2011. Levine led the orchestra in wide-ranging programs that included works newly commissioned for the orchestra’s 125th anniversary, particularly from significant American composers; issued a number of live concert performances on the orchestra’s own label, BSO Classics; taught at the Tanglewood Music Center; and in 2007 led the BSO in an acclaimed tour of European music festivals. In May 2013, a new chapter in the history of the Boston Symphony Orchestra was initiated when the internationally acclaimed young Latvian conductor Andris Nelsons was announced as the BSO’s next music director, a position he took up in the 2014-15 season, following a year as music director designate.

Today, the Boston Symphony Orchestra continues to fulfill and expand upon the vision of its founder Henry Lee Higginson, not only through its concert performances, educational offerings, and internet presence, but also through its expanding use of virtual and electronic media in a manner reflecting the BSO’s continuing awareness of today’s modern, ever-changing, 21st-century world. For further information about the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s many activities, visit www.bso.org.

TICKET INFORMATION
Tickets for the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s 2015-16 appearances at Carnegie Hall are available on subscription at the Carnegie Hall Box Office, 154 West 57th Street, New York. They may also be charged to major credit cards by calling CarnegieCharge at 212-247-7800 or purchased online at the Carnegie Hall website, www.carnegiehall.org. Single tickets to Boston Symphony Orchestra concerts for the 2015-2016season will be available in late August.

ANDRIS NELSONS AND THE BSO AT CARNEGIE HALL October 20, 21, & 22, 2015
Stern Auditorium / Perelman Stage

Tuesday, October 20, 2015 at 8 p.m.
Boston Symphony Orchestra
Andris Nelsons, Conductor
Paul Lewis, piano
CURRIER Divisions (New York Premiere, BSO co-commission)
BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No. 3
BRAHMS Symphony No. 2

Wednesday, October 21, 2015 at 8 p.m.
Boston Symphony Orchestra
Andris Nelsons, Conductor
Christine Goerke, soprano (Elektra)
Gun-Brit Barkmin, soprano (Chrysothemis)
Jane Henschel, mezzo-soprano (Klytaemnestra)
Gerhard Siegel, tenor (Aegisth)
James Rutherford, baritone (Orest)
STRAUSS Elektra (concert performance)

Thursday, October 22, 2015 at 8:00 p.m.
Boston Symphony Orchestra
Andris Nelsons, Conductor
Nadezhda Serdyuk, mezzo-soprano
Tanglewood Festival Chorus
   John Oliver, Conductor
PROKOFIEV Alexander Nevsky
RACHMANINOFF Symphonic Dances