by Paul J. Pelkonen
A seating chart for the Philharmonic's upcoming concert at the Park Avenue Armory.
All images © 2012 the New York Philharmonic.
The New York Philharmonic are ending the 2012 season in grand style with Philharmonic 360, a concert at the Park Avenue Armory.
It will host the orchestra for two performances on June 29 and 30. The concerts feature an unusual program bridging three centuries of music-making, and an unusual venue: the Park Avenue Armory.
These concerts mark the New York premiere of Gruppen, Karlheinz Stockhausen's work written for three seperate orchestras, with the audience seated in the middle. Stockhausen is an important 20th century German composer who was a pioneer in the field of electronic music, creating dense, complicated sound structures that are nonetheless eerily beautiful. Stockhausen's work requires three conductors: music director Alan Gilbert, composer-in-residence Magnus Lindberg, and Matthias Pintscher.
The Armory's enormous Drill Hall was home for many years to the famed Seventh Regiment. It was known as the "Silk Stocking Regiment", a military reserve unit made up of New York's social elite.
The Philharmonic played concerts here in 1884, with a chorus of 3,000 singers.
Today, the Drill Hall is used for art exhibits, concerts, and even opera, including a 2008
Lincoln Center Festival performance of Zimmermann's Die Soldaten.
Did we mention it's the size of a New York city block? It's big.
A special stage setup will be built for the performances in this artist's model.
The 360 concert also features:- Pierre Boulez' Rituel en memoriam Bruno Maderna, a large-scale chamber music composition designed for eight groups of musicians.
- Charles Ives' The Unanswered Question, a musical dialog for strings, flutes and a distant solo trumpet.
- The finale of Act I of Mozart's Don Giovanni. In this private party at the title character's manor, the Don entertains his guests with three seperate small orchestras onstage, each playing different music. This is in addition to the singers and the players in the main ensemble, a challenge for any conductor.
Watch this short documentary about the creation of Philharmonic 360.
