What’s in a Name?

WQXR is taking a poll: Who’s Got the Best Nickname in Classical Music?

Pinky? MTT? Fima? Which artist will you choose?  The New York Philharmonic’s own Artist-in-Residence Manny Ax is in the running, so cast your vote!

It’s a Dog’s Life

The New York Philharmonic was busy this weekend — with the Orchestra’s debut in Davis, CA and the first of two concerts as part of the San Francisco Symphony’s Centennial celebrations — but the intrepid New Yorkers found time for a friendly softball grudge match against the home team, as well as a backstage gatherings with friends old and new, including San Francisco Symphony Music Director (and one-time conductor of the Philharmonic Young People’s Concerts) Michael Tilson Thomas and his dog, Banda.

Check out the play on the field and on the stage by traveling on the CALIFORNIA 2012 virtual tour.

An Avalanche of Accolades

Another exciting year for Alan Gilbert and the Philharmonic, with many of the Orchestra’s performances ranking atop critics’ lists of 2011’s best cultural events. Were you part of the scene that made this past year a musical success:

• The Cunning Little Vixen was ranked on the lists of The New York Times (Vivien Schweitzer and Anthony Tommasini), New York magazine, Time, and Time Out New York

• West Side Story made Amanda MacBlane’s ”The Best Events” list in Time Out New York

• the Kurt Masur-led performances of Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 13, “Babi Yar” with Sergei Leiferkus ranked on WQXR’s “The Best of 2011 in Opera”

• Michael Tilson Thomas’s “The Thomashefskys: Music and Memories of a Life in the Yiddish Theater” made The Jewish Daily Forward’s “Forward Fives”

• “The Big City” blog gave a nod to “A Concert for New York — in Remembrance and Renewal,” the Philharmonic’s performance and live broadcast of Mahler’s “Resurrection” Symphony to mark the Tenth Anniversary of 9/11, as well as the live DVD recording release of that concert

• Honorable mention went to Hungarian Echoes, a three-week festival led by Esa-Pekka Salonen, which explored the music of Haydn, Bartók, and Ligeti

• And in the realm of technology and innovation, the Philharmonic garnered kudos in The New York Times for the launch of its Digital Archives

Stay tuned to Tumblr for what Philharmonic events we are most looking forward to in 2012.

“They were like the Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor of their time,” Michael Tilson Thomas said of his grandparents, Boris and Bessie Thomashefsky, in a recent article in The Jewish Week. He pays tribute to their legacy in The Thomashefskys: Music and Memories of a Life in the Yiddish Theater, which the Philharmonic performs with him next Tuesday and Wednesday, April 5 and 6.

“It’s one of the most moving, if not for me, the deepest running piece for violin written in the last hundred years.” — Anne-Sophie Mutter

This edition of On the Music features violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter, The Mary and James G. Wallach Artist-in-Residence, talking about Sofia Gubaidulina’s In Tempus Praesens, which will receive its New York Premiere on the Philharmonic concerts of March 31 and April 1–2, conducted by Michael Tilson Thomas. Also on the program: Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 2, Little Russian, and Prokofiev’s Overture in B-flat major, American. 

Listen to more of the Philharmonic’s award-winning podcast series here.