Season schedules — Part 1: Pasadena Symphony and Hollywood Bowl

By Robert D. Thomas
Music Critic
Los Angeles Newspaper Group
Pasadena Star-News/San Gabriel Valley Tribune/Whittier Daily News

It’s that time of the year when schedules for 2015 and 2016 begin to appear in mailboxes (electronic and USPS). Read my story about the 2015-2016 PASADENA SYMPHONY season published in the above papers HERE.

Among other schedules that have popped up:

HAVING ESTABLISHED A PATTERN that seems to provide maximum variety and healthy income to the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Hollywood Bowl’s 2015 summer schedule offers more of the same for the season that begins June 13 and extends through September 27.

The bulk of the season features popular and movie fare but the 10-week classical season, with concerts on Tuesday and Thursday, features a number of interesting programs. Among those that caught my eye:
• Composer/conductor Tan Dun conducts a program of his own “Martial Arts Trilogy” on Aug. 13, including his Crouching Tiger concerto and his Triple Concerto, which had its West Coast premiere last week at Walt Disney Concert Hall The Bowl concerts will include film clips.

• Now Music Director of the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, Lionel Bringuier returns to conduct the L.A. Phil (where he served for six years in various conducting capacities) to open the 2015 Bowl classical season. The July 7 concert will include Yuja Wang as soloist in Prokofiev’s second concerto, while Thursday’s program will pair Tchaikovsky’s and Prokofiev’s takes on Romeo and Juliet themes along with Tchaikovsky’s Rococo Variations, with Narek Hakhnazaryan — gold medalist in the 2011 Tchaikovsky International Competition — as cello soloist.

• LAPO Music Director Gustavo Dudamel has several program scheduled. On July 21 and 23, he conducts the orchestra, L.A. Master Chorale, L.A. Children’s Chorus and three soloists in performances of Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana and music by Eric Whitacre.

On that weekend, Dudamel leads the annual “Tchaikovsky Spectacular” for the first time. The program will include Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5, Swan Lake excerpts and, of course, the 1812 Overture, with fireworks, cannon shots and the USC Marching Band in accompaniment. The 5th Symphony was the vehicle with which Dudamel made an electrifying Bowl and L.A. Phil debut in September 2005 (see this review by the late, great critic Alan Rich HERE).

The following week Dudamel leads an all-Mendelssohn program on July 28 and an all-Mozart program on July 30.

• Other guest conductors are James Gaffigan; Joshua Bell, also soloing on the violin; Daniel Harding; Nicholas McGegan leading a program with Cameron Carpenter soloing in the Poulenc Organ Concerto on Carpenter’s International Touring Organ INFO); Bramwell Tovey; Lahav Shani; and Pablo Heras-Casado. LAPO Assistant Conductor Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla will also lead a program.

http://www.sgvtribune.com/arts-and-entertainment/20141114/organist-cameron-carpenter-la-philharmonic-to-celebrate-walt-disney-concert-hall-pipe-organ

• The “Sing-Along Sound of Music” program on June 26 will celebrate the movie’s 50th anniversary. Other programs with either the L.A. Phil accompanying films and/or film clips are Back to the Future on June 30 (this year is BTF’s 30th anniversary), the 25th anniversary of Bugs Bunny at the Movies on Aug. 14 and 15. 2001: A Space Odyssey on Aug. 18, and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial on Sept. 4, 5 and 6.

Live performances of Monte Python’s Spamalot will take place July 31, August 1 and 2, while — for something completely different — the annual opera night will be Verdi’s La Traviata on Aug. 9 when Daniel Harding leads the L.A. Phil and an as-yet-unnamed cast.

Information: www.hollywoodbowl.com
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(c) Copyright 2015, Robert D. Thomas. All rights reserved. Portions may be quoted with attribution.

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