For its 2006-07 season, the Houston Symphony
announced a coup.
Yo-Yo Ma, the world's most
popular cellist, will stop here for a full three-concert subscription series
program instead of his now customary one-night gala. He'll play the world's most
favorite cello concerto, Dvorák's (Jan. 18, 20-21, 2007).
"Aurelie (Demarais)
was talking with angels' tongues," music director Hans Graf quipped about
his artistic administrator's success in snaring Ma.
On the other hand, because
celebrity pianist Lang Lang's schedule was so full, Houston could get him for
only one, nonsubscription concert (May 16, 2007). He'll play works of Chopin
and Liszt.
Overall, the 2006-07 classical
programs continue the symphony's careful balance between selling tickets and
offering artistically challenging programs.
The nine-program
pops series will feature the Houston debut of the 18-year-old New Zealand singing
sensation Hayley Westenra.
Typical of Graf's ideas
is the pairing of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, with the last-movement setting
of Schiller's Ode to Joy, and John Adams' meditation
honoring victims of 9/11, On the Transmigration of Souls (Sept.
14, 16-17).
He will also pair two Russian
works memorializing horrific foreign invasions: Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture
and Shostakovich's Symphony No. 7, Leningrad (Nov.
9, 11-12).
Among more popular programs
will be a Who's Who of Russian composers with pianist Louis Lortie playing concertos
of Tchaikovsky and Prokofiev (Sept. 28, 30, Oct 1). An all-Gershwin program closes
the season with Rice University pianist Jon Kimura Parker soloing in the Piano
Concerto (May 17, 19-20, 2007).
Graf will also conduct Bruckner's
Symphony No. 8 (Jan 12-14, 2007) and Shostakovich's Suite
on Sonnets of Michelangelo Buonarroti with Beethoven's Eroica Symphony
(March 1, 2-4, 2007).
Two conductors will make
debuts: Norwegian Arild Remmereit and Brit Jane Glover (for Handel's Messiah).
Returning maestros are Jeffrey
Kahane, Thomas Dausgaard, Robert Spano (music director of the Atlanta Symphony
Orchestra), Carlos Kalmar, Peter Oundjian, Claus Peter Flor (an all-Wagner program)
and Itzhak Perlman (two nonsubscriptions concerts on which he'll also play).
Soloists debuting are Chinese
pianist Yuja Wang and American pianist Jeremy Dent.
For information, call 713-224-7575.
charles.ward@chron.com.
