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ALAN GILBERT AND THE NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC present the WORLD PREMIERE–NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC COMMISSION of Wynton MARSALIS’s The Jungle (Symphony No. 4) With the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis
From Wednesday, December 28, 2016
To Tuesday, January 03, 2017
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Contact Contact Katherine E. Johnson at (212) 875-5700, via email at [email protected]

December 28, 2016 - January 3, 2017 - ALAN GILBERT AND THE NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC present the WORLD PREMIERE–NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC COMMISSION of
Wynton MARSALIS’s The Jungle (Symphony No. 4) With the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis.  Also on the concert are William BOLCOM’s Trombone Concerto with Principal Trombone JOSEPH ALESSI and COPLAND’s Quiet City with Principal Trumpet CHRISTOPHER MARTIN and English Horn Player GRACE SHRYOCK in Her Philharmonic Solo Debut.  Music Director Alan Gilbert will conduct the New York Philharmonic in the World Premiere of Pulitzer Prize winner Wynton Marsalis’s The Jungle (Symphony No. 4), commissioned by the Philharmonic as the first of The New York Commissions, with the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis; William Bolcom’s Trombone Concerto with Principal Trombone Joseph Alessi as soloist; and Copland’s Quiet City, featuring Principal Trumpet Christopher Martin and English horn player Grace Shryock in her Philharmonic solo debut. The performances take place Wednesday, December 28, 2016, at 7:30 p.m.; Thursday, December 29 at 7:30 p.m.; Friday, December 30 at 8:00 p.m.; and Tuesday, January 3 at 7:30 p.m.

Wynton Marsalis’s The Jungle is the first of The New York Commissions, in which the Philharmonic is celebrating its long history as an active commissioner and New York City cultural institution by commissioning works on New York–inspired themes from New York–based composers with strong ties to the Orchestra, on the occasion of the Philharmonic’s 175th anniversary season. The other two works in this project, to be composed by Sean Shepherd and Julia Wolfe, will be premiered in the 2018–19 season. On these concerts Mr. Marsalis pairs a new work, inspired by New York City, with Copland’s Quiet City, another piece about New York City composed by an American.  Alan Gilbert said of The New York Commissions: “I’ve always tried to make the New York Philharmonic not just an orchestra that happens to be in New York, but an orchestra of New York that is New York’s orchestra in a very meaningful way. We’ve asked three composers, very good friends, to write works on what New York means to them.”  The premiere results from a cross-campus collaboration between the Philharmonic and fellow Lincoln Center constituent Jazz at Lincoln Center, of which Mr. Marsalis is artistic and managing director. “One thing I’ve been interested in pursuing with the Philharmonic is collaboration with important cultural institutions across New York City,” Alan Gilbert said. “Jazz at Lincoln Center with Wynton Marsalis was an obvious choice. Wynton is such an iconic figure: a great artist, instrumentalist, teacher, and communicator who really believes in the power of music and the importance of bringing people into our world.”  Wynton Marsalis writes of The Jungle: “New York City is the most fluid, pressure-packed, and cosmopolitan metropolis the modern world has ever seen. The dense mosaic of all kinds of people everywhere doing all kinds of things encourages you to ‘stay in your lane,’ but the speed, freedom, and intensity of our relationships to each other — and to the city itself — forces us onto a collective super highway unlike any other in our country.” This will be the third original work that the Philharmonic has commissioned from Mr. Marsalis: the Orchestra and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra performed the World Premiere–Philharmonic Commission of All Rise in December 1999, led by Kurt Masur, and the U.S. Premiere–Philharmonic Co-Commission of Swing Symphony (Symphony No. 3) on Opening Night 2010, led by Alan Gilbert.  The performances of William Bolcom’s Trombone Concerto reprise its June 2016 premiere in the NY PHIL BIENNIAL, also with Principal Trombone Joseph Alessi and led by Alan Gilbert. The New York Times wrote that “Mr. Alessi’s technical aplomb during fleet passages was impressively effortless.” The Philharmonic has performed six works by William Bolcom since 1973, including the World Premiere of his Clarinet Concerto, commissioned by the Philharmonic (1992, with former Principal Clarinet Stanley Drucker and led by Leonard Slatkin) as part of its 150th anniversary celebration. Joseph Alessi premiered 2012–15 Marie-Josée Kravis Composer-in-Residence Christopher Rouse’s Pulitzer Prize–winning Trombone Concerto, also commissioned for the Orchestra’s 150th anniversary project (1992, led by Leonard Slatkin), and Melinda Wagner’s Trombone Concerto (2007, led by Lorin Maazel).

Location David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center, New York, NY

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