Gustavo Dudamel, the Music Director Designate of the New York Philharmonic, commences the orchestra’s highly-anticipated season with the Symphony No. 1 by John Corigliano. The piece is performed four times alongside Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5 from September 18 to 21.
The pairing of these two masterworks is inspired and fearless programming from Dudamel and the Philharmonic. Both symphonies are profound meditations on life and death, and are also perfect showcases for the power of the orchestra. Although they both begin with rage and ferocity, their endings are quite distinct. Beethoven’s concludes victoriously, while Corigliano’s slowly and tenderly moves toward somber stillness, paying loving homage to the many victims of the AIDS epidemic.
John Corigliano is one of classical music's most cherished and influential New Yorkers, and his decorated first symphony, which has received three GRAMMY Awards along with the prestigious Grawemeyer Award for Music Composition, has a long history with both Dudamel and the New York Philharmonic. Dudamel toured Symphony No. 1 through North America in 2016 with the Los Angeles Philharmonic; the New York Philharmonic first performed the symphony in 1992 at the height of the AIDS epidemic. It was last performed by the New York Philharmonic in 2019 as part of the orchestra’s Music of Conscience festival; both of these performances were accompanied by the presence of panels from the Nobel Peace Prize–nominated AIDS Memorial Quilt.
John Corigliano grew up around the New York Philharmonic, where his father was concertmaster from 1943 to 1966. As a young man, Corigliano worked with Leonard Bernstein on the Philharmonic’s telecasts of their signature Young People’s Concerts. As a composer, John Corigliano has been working with the orchestra for nearly half a century. The New York Philharmonic have commissioned major works from Corigliano including the 1977 Clarinet Concerto and 2011’s One Sweet Morning. In 2018, they performed Corigliano’s OSCAR-winning score to The Red Violin live-to-picture with violinist Joshua Bell. And earlier in 2025, the orchestra performed Triathlon, Corigliano’s recent saxophone concerto, with soloist Timothy McAllister and conductor Leonard Slatkin.
For more information, please contact your local Wise Music Promotion Team; Contact Us.
