- Produced by Barbican
- Price Tickets from £30 to £50
- Get ready for Alan Gilbert to lead the orchestra in the glamour of Mahler and Berlioz, alongside contemporary works by John Adams and Esa-Pekka Salonen
- Bring along someone in need of a major April Fooling
- Surf to Tickets
- See you at Barbican
Surely you jest? John Adams and Berlioz's epic musical pranks form the second concert of the New York Philharmonic’s residency.
New York never stands on ceremony, and this concert finds John Adams making Beethoven himself the subject of a very modern practical joke.
Outrageous? Not as outrageous as Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique when played by Alan Gilbert and his virtuoso orchestra.
And you might say Beethoven was asking for it. Scherzo means ‘joke’, after all, and Adams’s Absolute Jest is another, brilliantly witty attempt to reinvent the way we hear the world.
What better tribute to Beethoven’s own revolutionary spirit - or Berlioz’s huge, delirious, opium-fuelled orchestral extravaganza: a chance to hear Gilbert’s New Yorkers at their spectacular sonic best.
Beethoven Excerpts from String Quartet No 14 in C sharp minor,
Op 131; String Quartet No 16 in F major, Op 135; Grosse Fuge
John Adams Absolute Jest
Berlioz Symphonie Fantastique
New York Philharmonic
Alan Gilbert conductor
Frank Huang violin
Sheryl Staples violin
Cynthia Phelps viola
Carter Brey cello
Forming part of Reich, Glass, Adams: The Sounds that Changed America series
