Concert Review: Uncommon Ground

Sir Antonio Pappano visits the New York Philharmonic.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Sir Antonio Pappano.
Photo © Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia.

For a generation of classical music lovers your humble scribe included) the juxtaposition of composers Camille Saint-Saëns and Benjamin Britten with the New York Philharmonic brings a smile of nostalgia. These two composers were featured on a classic 196- album conducted by Leonard Bernstein, which used Saint-Saëns’ The Carnival of the Animals and Britten’s The Young Persons’ Guide to the Orchestra to teach a generation the intonations of the various instruments that together make up the modern symphony.

Concert Review: Famous When You're Dead

The Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia plays Mahler and Sciarrino.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Sir Antonio Pappano.
Photo © 2010 Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia

What is "fame"? What is the "canon"? And what is the elusive quality that entitles a composer to enshrinement in that small group of music makers that have been venerated from one century to the next, their works resounding in concert halls around the world. Those thoughts apply to Saturday night's concert at Carnegie Hall, where the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia and Sir Antonio Pappano offered an evening in two parts: the New York premiere of a new work by Salvatore Sciarrino and Gustav Mahler's weighty Symphony No. 6.