ABOUT THE LA PHIL

DANIIL TRIFONOV

Grammy Award-winning pianist Daniil Trifonov—Musical America’s 2019 Artist of the Year—has established a reputation as a solo artist, champion of the concerto repertoire, chamber and vocal collaborator, and composer. Combining consummate technique with rare sensitivity and depth, his performances are a perpetual source of wonder to audiences and critics alike. With Transcendental, the Liszt collection that marked his third title as an exclusive Deutsche Grammophon artist, he won the Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Solo Album of 2018. As The Times of London notes, he is “without question the most astounding pianist of our age.”

In the 2021/22 season, Trifonov releases Bach: The Art of Life on Deutsche Grammophon, tours a recital program in Europe based on the album, and tours a different program in the U.S. He plays Brahms’ First Piano Concerto with Fabio Luisi and the Dallas Symphony, Gianandrea Noseda and Philharmonia Zurich, Xian Zhang and the New Jersey Symphony, and with Antonio Pappano and Rome’s Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia on a European tour. He also performs all five of Beethoven’s piano concertos in various combinations with seven different orchestras: the New York Philharmonic, Cincinnati Symphony, Munich Philharmonic, Mariinsky Orchestra, Orchestre des Champs-Élysées, Budapest Festival Orchestra, and Toronto Symphony. Finally, he gives the world-premiere performances of Mason Bates’ new Piano Concerto, composed for him during the pandemic, with the co-commissioning Philadelphia Orchestra, the New Jersey Symphony, the Israel Philharmonic, and the other co-commissioner, the San Francisco Symphony.

In recent seasons, Trifonov served as Artist-inResidence of the New York Philharmonic—a residency which included the New York premiere of his own Piano Quintet—and curated and performed a seven-concert season-long Carnegie Hall “Perspectives” series, crowned by a performance of his own Piano Concerto with Valery Gergiev and the Mariinsky Orchestra. He has played solo recitals around the world since his Carnegie Hall debut in 2012/13, and his discography on Deutsche Grammophon includes a live recording of his Carnegie recital debut; Chopin Evocations; and three volumes of Rachmaninoff works with the Philadelphia Orchestra and Yannick Nézet-Séguin, one of them receiving a 2021 Grammy nomination and another earning the BBC Music 2019 Concerto Recording of the Year accolade.

During the 2010/11 season, Trifonov won medals at three of the music world’s most prestigious competitions: Third Prize in Warsaw’s Chopin Competition, First Prize in Tel Aviv’s Rubinstein Competition, and both First Prize and Grand Prix in Moscow’s Tchaikovsky Competition. He began his musical training at the age of five, attended Moscow’s Gnessin School of Music, and continued his piano studies with Sergei Babayan at the Cleveland Institute of Music.

daniiltrifonov.com

The Rite of Spring and Estancia with Dudamel

Los Angeles Philharmonic

Gustavo Dudamel, conductor Gustavo Castillo, baritone/narrator

Alex NANTE El Río de Luz (c. 6 minutes) (world premiere, LA Phil commission)

GINASTERA Estancia, Op. 8 (complete) (c. 33 minutes) Dawn: Introduction and scene—Brief Dance Morning—Wheat Dance—The Land Workers— The Ranch Hands—The Townspeople Afternoon: “Triste” from the Pampas— Horse-breaking—Twilight Idyll Night: Nocturne Dawn: Scene—Final Dance: Malambo

Gustavo Castillo

INTERMISSION

STRAVINSKY The Rite of Spring (c. 33 minutes) Part I: The Adoration of the Earth Introduction Augurs of Spring: Dance of the Young Girls Ritual of Abduction Spring Rounds Ritual of the Two Tribes Procession of the Sage The Kiss of the Earth (The Sage) Dance of the Earth Part II: The Exalted Sacrifice Introduction Mystic Circle of the Young Girls The Naming and Honoring of the Chosen One Evocation of the Ancestors Sacrificial Dance (The Chosen One) Official Timepiece of the Los Angeles Philharmonic

Classical Partner (5/06):

KUSC

THURSDAY

MAY 5, 2022 8PM

FRIDAY

MAY 6 8PM

SATURDAY MAY 7 8PM

SUNDAY

MAY 8 2PM

Programs and artists subject to change.

EL RÍO DE LUZ

Alex Nante (b. 1992)

Composed: 2022

Orchestration: piccolo, 2 flutes, 3 oboes, 2 clarinets, bass clarinet, 2 bassoons, contrabassoon, 4 horns, 3 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, percussion (chimes, glockenspiel, vibraphone, tam-tam, suspended cymbal, bass drum), harp, and strings.

First LA Phil performance:

world premiere

Alex Nante (born in Buenos Aires, Argentina) is one of the most recognized Latin American composers of his generation. In his works, ranging from solo to orchestral pieces, there is a nocturnal and dreamlike atmosphere, as well as an attempt to access a spiritual realm. The influence of Eastern and Western mystical poetry is particularly present in his compositions, as can be seen in several of his vocal pieces. Winner of several awards, already nominated as a composer for the Victoires de la musique in France in 2022, he has worked with the most prestigious ensembles and soloists on an international level. During his residency at the Lille National Orchestra for the 2021/22 and 2022/23 seasons, Alex Nante composed Sinfonia del Cuerpo de Luz, the piano concerto Luz de lejos, dedicated to Alexandre Tharaud, and will compose Mysterium, his second symphony for orchestra with choir and two solo singers: soprano and tenor.

El Río de Luz (The River of Light) is part of a cycle of pieces based on the element of light, which includes Sinfonía del Cuerpo de Luz and the piano concerto Luz de lejos. El Río de Luz was conceived as a flowing, glittering, mercurial juxtaposition of musical “light fragments.” This “light journey” is inspired by the following passage in Honoré de Balzac’s Séraphîta:

“The light gave birth to the melody, the melody gave birth to the light, the colors were light and melody, the movement was a Number endowed with the Word; finally, everything there was at the same time sonorous, diaphanous, mobile, so that each thing penetrating one another, the expanse was without obstacle and could be traversed by the Angels in the depth of infinity.”

El Río de Luz is dedicated to Gustavo Dudamel and Los Angeles Philharmonic. —Alex Nante

ESTANCIA, OP. 8 (COMPLETE)

Alberto Ginastera (1916–1983)

Composed: 1941

Orchestration: 2 flutes (=piccolos), 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, timpani, percussion (bass drum, castanets, cymbals, military drum, tam-tam, tambourine, tenor drum, triangle, xylophone), piano, strings, and solo baritone

First LA Phil performance:

July 23, 1960, Maurice Levine conducting the four dances from the ballet Alberto Ginastera composed brilliantly in most genres— concertos, songs, string quartets, piano sonatas, and a number of film scores—but is best known for his early ballets Panambé and Estancia and the operas Don Rodrigo, Bomarzo, and Beatrix Cenci. Argentine folk songs and dances inspired and informed much of his music, whether in direct reference or in stylistic allusion. Later in his career he began to incorporate 12tone techniques and avantgarde procedures into his music, ultimately reaching a synthesis of traditional and post-serial elements.

Estancia was composed the same year the Argentinean composer met his North American contemporary Aaron Copland, who was touring South America. Estancia was commissioned by Lincoln Kirstein (who had earlier commissioned Copland’s Billy the Kid), but his Ballet Caravan folded before Estancia could be produced. Plot, scenes, and texture of the piece are derived from the poem Martín Fierro, by José Hernández, written in the 1870s as a nationalist expression of the gaucho and a repudiation of the changes to the rural life brought about by political and military struggle. As important as the substance of the poem is the style. As noted by translators C.E. Ward and Kate Ward Kavanagh, “Hernández’ poem aimed to speak to the country people in their own language about their own troubles. It tells the adventures and opinions of an archetypal gaucho suffering the hardships and injustice of