NY Phil: Trifonov & Babayan Play Bartók

• Sergei Babayan, piano
• Daniil Trifonov, piano
• Christopher S. Lamb, percussion
• Daniel Druckman, percussion
• Markus Rhoten, percussion
• Hannu Lintu, conductor

Piano superstar Daniil Trifonov joins forces with his former teacher, Sergei Babayan, in Bartók's rarely performed Concerto for Two Pianos and Percussion. Finnish conductor Hannu Lintu completes the program with Kaija Saariaho's evocation of the heavens and Stravinsky's virtuosic showpiece for winds.

These concerts will be streamed on the Hauser Digital Wall.

About New York Philharmonic

https://nyphil.org/

About Sergei Babayan, piano

http://sergeibabayan.com/en

About Daniil Trifonov, piano

Grammy Award-winning pianist Daniil Trifonov (dan-EEL TREE-fon-ov)—Musical America’s 2019 Artist of the Year—has established a reputation as a solo artist, champion of the concerto repertoire, chamber and vocal collaborator, and composer. Combining consummate technique with rare sensitivity and depth, his performances are a perpetual source of wonder to audiences and critics alike. With Transcendental, the Liszt collection that marked his third title as an exclusive Deutsche Grammophon artist, he won the Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Solo Album of 2018. As The Times of London notes, he is “without question the most astounding pianist of our age.”

In the 2021-22 season, Trifonov released Bach: The Art of Life on Deutsche Grammophon and embarked on recital tours of the U.S. and Europe, where his program was inspired by the album. He performed Brahms’ First Piano Concerto with both the Dallas Symphony under Fabio Luisi and Philharmonia Zurich under Gianandrea Noseda, as well as playing Mozart’s Ninth “Jeunehomme” Concerto on a European tour with Antonio Pappano and Rome’s Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia. Trifonov also performed all five of Beethoven’s Piano Concertos in various combinations with eight different orchestras, including the New York Philharmonic, Munich Philharmonic, and Toronto Symphony. Finally, he gave the world premiere performances of Mason Bates’ new Piano Concerto, composed for him during the pandemic, with ensembles including the co-commissioning Philadelphia Orchestra and San Francisco Symphony.

In recent seasons Trifonov served as Artist-in-Residence of the New York Philharmonic—a residency that included the New York premiere of his own Piano Quintet—and curated and performed a seven-concert, season-long Carnegie Hall “Perspectives” series, crowned by a performance of his own Piano Concerto. He has played solo recitals around the world since his Carnegie Hall debut in 2012-13, and his Deutsche Grammophon discography includes a live recording of his Carnegie recital debut; Chopin Evocations; Silver Age, for which he received Opus Klassik’s 2021 Instrumentalist of the Year/Piano award; and three volumes of Rachmaninoff works with the Philadelphia Orchestra and Yannick Nézet-Séguin, of which one received a 2021 Grammy nomination and another won BBC Music’s 2019 Concerto Recording of the Year. In 2016 he was named Gramophone’s Artist of the Year and in 2021 he was made a “Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres” by the French government.

During the 2010-11 season, Trifonov won medals at three of the music world’s most prestigious competitions: Third Prize in Warsaw’s Chopin Competition, First Prize in Tel Aviv’s Rubinstein Competition, and both First Prize and Grand Prix in Moscow’s Tchaikovsky Competition. He began his musical training at the age of five, attended Moscow’s Gnessin School of Music, and continued his piano studies with Sergei Babayan at the Cleveland Institute of Music.

About Christopher S. Lamb, percussion

Grammy Award–winning percussionist Christopher Lamb has been hailed as a dynamic and versatile performer. Having joined the New York Philharmonic as Principal Percussionist in 1985, The Constance R. Hoguet Friends of the Philharmonic Chair, he subsequently made his solo debut with the Orchestra in the World Premiere of Joseph Schwantner’s Percussion Concerto, one of several commissions celebrating the Philharmonic’s 150th anniversary. He has since performed the work to critical acclaim with orchestras throughout the United States and in 2011 won a Grammy for Best Classical Instrumental Soloist for his recording of Schwantner’s Percussion Concerto with the Nashville Symphony. Lamb also gave the World Premiere of Tan Dun’s Concerto for Water Percussion, a second work commissioned for him by the New York Philharmonic, and has performed it to rave reviews on the Philharmonic’s tour to South America, as well as in Asia and Europe with such notable orchestras as the London Philharmonic Orchestra, Amsterdam’s Royal Concertgebouw, Leipzig’s Gewandhaus Orchestra, and the Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra. In the United States, he has performed the work with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Baltimore Symphony, and the Pacific Symphony. New York Philharmonic Music Director Emeritus Kurt Masur selected Lamb’s performance of Tan Dun’s Concerto for Water Percussion for release in the Orchestra’s collection of recordings highlighting his tenure as Music Director. The third commission for Lamb by the New York Philharmonic, Susan Botti’s Echo Tempo for Soprano, Percussion, and Orchestra, was given its World Premiere by Ms. Botti, Lamb, and the New York Philharmonic under the baton of Masur.

A faculty member of the Manhattan School of Music since 1989, Christopher Lamb has led clinics and master classes throughout the United States and on almost every continent. In 1999 he was the recipient of a Fulbright Scholars Award to lecture and conduct research in Australia. During his five-month residency at the Victorian College of the Arts in Melbourne, he presented master classes and seminars titled “A Comprehensive Examination of Orchestral Percussion,” which has grown into a model for the art of teaching percussion. In 2010 Lamb was invited to join the faculty of the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland as an international fellow.

Lamb has recorded chamber works on the New World, Cala, and CRI labels, and his Grammy Award–winning performance of Schwantner’s Percussion Concerto is available on the Naxos label. Christopher Lamb is a former member of The Metropolitan Opera Orchestra and Buffalo Philharmonic and a graduate of the Eastman School of Music.

About Daniel Druckman, percussion

https://nyphil.org/about-us/artists/daniel-druckman

About Markus Rhoten, percussion

Markus Rhoten joined the New York Philharmonic as Principal Timpani in September 2006. Prior to this appointment he was the principal timpanist of the Berlin Symphony Orchestra, led by Eliahu Inbal.

Born in 1978 in Hanover, Germany, Rhoten attended the College of Arts in Berlin, and continued his studies as an apprentice with the National Opera Orchestra Mannheim. Subsequently, he was awarded a stipend for the Academy of the Bavarian Radio Orchestra in Munich, and in 2002 became principal timpanist of the Bavarian Radio Orchestra under Lorin Maazel. He has also worked with conductors Mariss Jansons, Riccardo Muti, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Franz Welser-Möst, Valery Gergiev, Christoph von Dohnányi, and Charles Dutoit, among others. Rhoten has performed with the Hessen Radio Symphony Orchestra; Zurich Opera Orchestra; North German Radio Philharmonic; Lower Saxony State Opera Orchestra; and Munich Philharmonic Orchestra, and can be heard on all of the Deutsche Grammophon recordings with the New York Philharmonic made after September 2006.

About Hannu Lintu, conductor

Hannu Lintu continues his tenure as Chief Conductor of the Finnish National Opera and Ballet. The appointment follows a series of hugely successful collaborations with the company – including Tristan und Isolde in 2016, Sibelius’s Kullervo in 2017, Berg’s Wozzeck in 2019 and Strauss’s Ariadne auf Naxos in 2020 – and reflects Lintu’s shifting focus into the field of opera. In the past season he conducted Strauss’ Salome and Britten’s Billy Budd. This season’s productions will include the majority of the house’s rescheduled Ring Cycle which will recommence with Die Walküre in September 2022.

Lintu recently completed his eighth and final season as the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra’s Chief Conductor.

Guest highlights of the 2022/23 season include the highly anticipated debut with New York Philharmonic and Atlanta Symphony and returns to St Louis and BBC Symphony orchestras. Lintu also guest conducts the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic, Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Konzerthaus Berlin, Gulbenkian Orchestra, Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne and Orchestre Symphonique de Montreal.

Lintu has made several recordings for Ondine, BIS, Naxos, Avie and Hyperion for which he has received several accolades including two ICMA awards and two GRAMMY nominations.

Lintu studied cello and piano at the Sibelius Academy, where he later studied conducting with Jorma Panula. He participated in masterclasses with Myung-Whun Chung at the L’Accademia Musicale Chigiana in Siena, Italy, and took first prize at the Nordic Conducting Competition in Bergen in 1994.