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2008 Tanglewood Season, Week Three, July 18-24

LENOX, MA: The Tanglewood season continues into its third week as BSO Music Director James Levine leads the Boston Symphony Orchestra in Mahler’s Symphony No. 1 and John Harbison’s Symphony No. 5, featuring baritone Thomas Meglioranza and mezzo-soprano Kate Lindsey, on Friday, July 18, in Tanglewood’s Koussevitzky Music Shed. Harbison’s Sumphony No. 5 was given its world premiere by the BSO, with Ms. Lindsey and baritone Nathan Gunn on April 17th of this year at Symphony Hall.

James Levine will also lead the BSO in the closing concert of the 2008 Festival of Contemporary Music (July 20-24), celebrating the 100th birthday year of legendary American composer Elliott Carter and his significant contributions to modern music, and marking the first time the BSO is featured as part of the festival programming. The program, to take place on July 24, at 8 p.m., in Ozawa Hall, will include Carter’s the Boston Concerto, Three Illusions for Orchestra, Horn Concerto featuring BSO principal horn James Sommerville, and Symphonia: Sum fluzae pretium spei. James Levine serves as Director of the 2008 Festival of Contemporary Music, marking the first in the 44-year history of the FCM that a BSO music director has taken on the leadership role of the festival. In addition, the 2008 FCM marks the first time the festival focuses on a single composer. The five-day festival also includes 11 concerts, several roundtable and panel discussions, four American or world premieres, and an interview with the composer himself, who turns 100 on December 11.

BSO Assistant Conductor Shi-Yeon Sung, the first woman to hold an assistant conductor position with the BSO in the orchestra’s 127-year history, will make her BSO debut leading the orchestra in Schumann’s Overture from the incidental music to Manfred and Mendelssohn’s Symphony No. 4, Italian, at 2:30 p.m. on Sunday, July 20, in the Tanglewood Shed. Garrick Ohlsson, piano will join Ms. Sung and the BSO to perform Schumann’s Piano Concerto in A minor. Born in South Korea, Shi-Yeon Sung is the winner of the 2006 International Conductors' Competition Sir Georg SOLTI, as well as the 2004 conducting competition for the Conducting Forum of the German Music Council, and the 2004 Female Conductors' Competition in Solingen, Germany.

World-renowned violinist Midori and the BSO, conducted by Leonard Slatkin, will perform Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto in D on Saturday July 19 at 8:30 p.m. in the Koussevitzky shed. The program also includes Vaughan Williams’ Five Variants of “Dives and Lazarus” and Copland’s Symphony No. 3.

Continuing this week and throughout the summer season, the Boston Symphony Orchestra will present a new Friday-evening panel discussion series, “This Week at Tanglewood,” to take place at 7 p.m., prior to all BSO Friday evening performances. Featuring special guests in informal and engaging discussions, the series will be hosted by Ira Siff, the co-host of the Saturday Metropolitan Opera broadcasts and the off-beat satirical director and brains behind La Gran Scena. Each 45-minute session will include an overview of the coming week’s schedule, including everything from BSO performances to Tanglewood Music Center concerts to children’s programming. Attendance to “This Week at Tanglewood” is free to patrons with tickets to Friday evening BSO concerts.

The Prelude Concert on Friday, July 18, at 6 p.m., in Ozawa Hall will feature members of the Boston Symphony Orchestra performing string quartets by Beethoven and Janacek. The Prelude Concert on Saturday July 19, at 6 p.m., in Ozawa Hall, will feature fellows of the Tanglewood Music Center performing works by Beethoven and Brahms. Attendance to Friday- and Saturday-evening Prelude Concerts is free to patrons with tickets to the evening’s BSO concerts.

Tanglewood, the summer home of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, is located in Lenox, MA. The 2008 season begins June 23 and continues through Labor Day weekend, concluding with the annual Jazz Festival. Tickets are on sale through Tanglewood’s website, www.tanglewood.org, and through SymphonyCharge at 888-266-1200. Regular season ticket prices range from $10-$105. Tickets for Open Rehearsals are $17. All ticket prices include a $1 Tanglewood grounds maintenance fee. Festival of Contemporary Music tickets are priced at $11 except for tickets to the July 24th BSO concert, which are priced from $16-$50.  Tickets are also available for purchase in person at the Tanglewood Box Office at Tanglewood’s Main Gate on West Street in Lenox beginning at 10 a.m. on June 13. American Express, Visa, MasterCard, Diners Club, Discover, personal checks, and cash are all accepted at the Tanglewood Box Office. The Tanglewood Box Office only sells tickets for performances at Tanglewood. For further information and box office hours, please call the Boston Symphony Orchestra at 617-266-1492 or visit www.bso.org.

CHILDREN’S LAWN AND STUDENT TICKET PROGRAMS

Tanglewood continues its Children’s Lawn Ticket Program, which offers free lawn seating to children age 12 and under. Up to four free children’s tickets are available per parent or legal guardian per concert at the Tanglewood Box Office on the day of the concert. Children admitted without charge must sit with their parent or legal guardian on the lawn, and those under 5 years old must sit on the rear half of the lawn. Children under 5 years are not permitted in the Koussevitzky Music Shed or Seiji Ozawa Hall during concerts. All patrons, regardless of age, must have a ticket. The free lawn-ticket policy does not apply to organized groups of children.  Additionally, Tanglewood is pleased to offer a 50 percent discount on lawn tickets for all BSO Friday evening concerts for students over age 12. This offer is valid only with a student identification card. Tickets may be purchased in person at the Main Box Office only on the night of the performance.

TANGLEWOOD PATRON AMENITIES

or Patrons who may not have a convenient way to get to and from Tanglewood, the BSO offers coach service from Boston to Tanglewood for only $30 round trip. Lawn chairs are available for only $4 each and pre-ordered meals are available in the Tanglewood Grille and the Tanglewood Café. “Talks and Walks” is a series of informal conversations presented by guest artists and members of the BSO family in the Tent Club on Thursday afternoons beginning with a talk at 1pm and a guided tour of the grounds at 1:45pm. Tickets for “Talks and Walks” are $80 for a full series and $15 for individual tickets. New this year for ticketholders, Tanglewood offers a free panel discussion series called “This Week at Tanglewood” on Fridays at 7 in the Koussevitzky Shed and a free hour-long walking tour of Tanglewood’s grounds and performance spaces daily. Tanglewood additionally offers large video screens for the pleasure of lawn viewing patrons on Friday and Saturday nights and for the convenience of patrons, a Bank of America ATM outside the main gate.

FAMILY FRIENDLY ACTIVITIES AND CONCERTS
Tanglewood offers an array of programs for the entire family. Through its Tanglewood for Kids program, Tanglewood offers free lawn tickets, up to four per family, to all children ages 12 and under. Additionally, Tanglewood provides special programs for kids, such as the popular Kids’ Corner, a musical and craft-related project supervised and supported by BSO staff on weekends, and the Watch and Play program, a series of lively discussions about instruments, concert themes, and/or musical concepts on Sundays. On August 23, Tanglewood will present its annual Family Concert featuring Tubby the Tuba. Tickets for the Family Concert are free for children ages 12 and under and $10 for each adult.

BSO RADIO BROADCASTS, STREAMING, PODCASTS, AND “CLASSICAL COMPANION”
The Boston Symphony Orchestra’s extensive website, www.bso.org is the largest and most-visited orchestral website in the country, receiving more than 5.8 million visitors annually and generating almost $40 million in revenue since its launch in 1996. The BSO’s website offers fans information and music beyond the concert hall, providing interactive new media that includes “Classical Companion”, an interactive supplement of special BSO concerts, as well as podcasts from the BSO’s 2007-2008 season. Additionally, the BSO offers WGBH content as well as links to radio broadcasts of concerts streamed live on www.wgbh.com, www.wqxr.com and www.wamc.com.

Tanglewood, located in the Berkshires of western Massachusetts, is the orchestra’s summer music festival, attracting more than 300,000 music lovers from around the world for 10 weeks of concerts and recitals by the BSO, visiting orchestras, preeminent guest musicians, and popular artists. Tanglewood also houses the Tanglewood Music Center, an intensive summer training program for emerging professional musicians of exceptional ability and a vital component of the BSO’s ongoing educational mission.  For Berkshire tourist information and reservations, contact the Berkshire Visitors Bureau at 800-237-5747 or www.berkshires.org.  Tanglewood brochures with complete programs and information on how to order tickets are available by calling 617-638-9467. For further information, please call the Boston Symphony Orchestra at 617-266-1492 or visit www.tanglewood.org.  All programs and artists are subject to change.