Carnegie Hall's Opening Night Gala
The Philadelphia Orchestra
Performers
The Philadelphia Orchestra
Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Music Director and Conductor
Lang Lang, Piano
Chick Corea, Piano
with
Maxim Lando, Piano
Program
BERNSTEIN On the Waterfront Symphonic Suite
GERSHWIN Rhapsody in Blue
BERNSTEIN Symphonic Dances from West Side Story
Event Duration
The printed program will last approximately 75 minutes with no intermission.Gala Leadership
Gala Lead Chairmen
Mercedes T. Bass
Hope and Robert F. Smith
Gala Chairmen Committee
Len and Emily Blavatnik
Aisha and Gbenga Oyebode
Annette de la Renta
Sana H. Sabbagh
Sangreal Foundation
Beatrice Santo Domingo
Brian and Adria Sheth
David M. Siegel and Dana Matsushita
Margaret and Ian Smith
Joan and Sanford I. Weill
Corporate Chairman
Dennis M. Nally
Retired Chairman,
PricewaterhouseCoopers International Ltd.
At a Glance
The Opening Night Gala of Carnegie Hall’s 2017–2018
season celebrates American music, New York City, and Leonard Bernstein,
whose 100th birthday is being honored worldwide this season.
The program starts with the Symphonic Suite from Bernstein’s only film score,
Elia Kazan’s Academy Award–winning On the Waterfront, which explores the gritty side of
New York’s docks. The concert concludes with Bernstein’s Symphonic Dances from the
beloved musical West Side Story,
the famous story of star-crossed lovers—a retelling of Romeo and Juliet for
the 20th century.
Bernstein brilliantly combined classical and jazz styles in many of his scores.
So, too, did his great precursor George Gershwin, nowhere more so than in Rhapsody
in Blue. The piece created a sensation at its 1924 premiere in New York at
a concert presented by the legendary bandleader Paul Whiteman with Gershwin as
piano soloist. Tonight, three soloists share the spotlight: Lang Lang is joined
by legendary jazz artist Chick Corea and 14-year-old Maxim Lando, an alumnus of
the Lang Foundation’s Young Scholars Program.