Composer Igor Stravinsky was born 139 years ago this month in Oranienbaum, Russia. Today we share our April performance of his Concerto for Piano and Wind Instruments, with conductor Leon Botstein and pianist Blair McMillen, which Stravinsky wrote in the early 1920s while living in France. In his notes on the piece, TŌN bass trombonist Jack E. Noble looks at why the composer chose the combination of piano and wind instruments for this concerto. “In an interview following the opening concerts Stravinsky expressed that ‘Strings and piano, a sound scraped and a sound struck, do not sound well together; piano and wind, sounds struck and blown, do.’ This is a noteworthy deviation from the norm which Stravinsky uses to highlight certain characteristics of sound. In particular, the percussive articulation of the piano stands out against the sustain of the winds.” You can read Jack’s full concert notes on the concerto by clicking here.

In honor of her recent Pulitzer Prize win for the piece “Stride,” we are pleased to present this encore presentation of our April 8, 2021 Zoom discussion with composer, conductor, and educator Tania León. She chatted with composer and musicologist Sebastian Danila and musicians from The Orchestra Now (TŌN) about her career and her Pulitzer Prize-nominated work “Ácana,” which TŌN performed on April 10, 2021.

We’re pleased to share our performance of Metamorphosen by Richard Strauss, who was born 157 years ago this week. Strauss wrote the piece in the final days of Nazi rule and sought to convey the meaning of how World War II had dramatically transformed humanity. It is constructed in a unique format for 23 solo strings—each of which has a part that is unique from all the others—that blend together to form an overwhelmingly rich texture. We performed the piece with conductor Leon Botstein for a livestream from the Fisher Center at Bard on November 1, 2020. You can read the concert notes, written by TŌN violinist Bram Margoles, by clicking here.

This summer, The Orchestra Now is pleased to release videos from our livestreamed, physically distanced concerts this past season. First up is Cuauhnáhuac by Mexican composer Silvestre Revueltas, which premiered 88 years ago this week. We performed the work on November 1, 2020 with conductor Leon Botstein. In her concert notes on the piece, TŌN violist Katelyn Hoag says “Cuauhnáhuac is a fascinating fusion that uniquely blends pre-Colombian musical techniques with those of European modernists Claude Debussy and Igor Stravinsky to create a distinctly modern Mexican sound.” You can read her complete notes by clicking here.