Messiaen is mixed with Adams, Ashkenazy with Dohnányi in David Robertson’s latest eclectic cocktail.

The return of Chinese piano superstar Lang Lang, Vladimir Ashkenazy’s Beethoven cycle and Christoph von Dohnányi making his Australian debut at 86 will be among the highlights of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra’s 2016 programme. Chief Conductor David Robertson and his team have mixed a heady cocktail of the old with the new as Bruckner and Brahms rub shoulders with Stravinksy and Messiaen, plus a raft of new commissions from leading Australian and international composers. Oh, and they’re doing Porgy and Bess as well!

^{Vladimir Ashkenazy will conduct Beethoven}

Robertson’s own conducting duties will see him deliver Olivier Messiaen’s colourful and profound 12-movement Des Canyons aux Étoiles (From the Canyons to the Stars) in a performance enhanced by photographic technology. Later in the season he will tackle the three great Stravinsky ballets in imaginative programmes that will see each complemented with newer works, while Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade is paired with John Adam’s contemporary violin concerto, Scheherazade.2. Gershwin’s multiple-hit opera Porgy and Bess is also due to be performed with a high-octane American cast acting up a storm in the concert hall.

Major maestros include the return of Vladimir Ashkenazy in a Beethoven project, which will see him conduct all nine of the symphonies, while veteran German conductor Christoph von Dohnányi has been tempted to our shores for the first time to preform signature works by Bruckner and Brahms. Pinchas Zuckerman, too, returns to both conduct and play the violin.

^{Christoph von Dohnányi}

The line up of soloists is headed by Lang Lang who should draw quite a crowd for the popular Grieg concerto, but also for a recital in the concert hall. Meanwhile, French pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard should prove equally enthralling in Robertson’s Messiaen orchestral concert and then offering his interpretation of the same composer’s intensely spiritual, digitally taxing Vingt Regards sur l’Enfant Jésus. Lars Vogt, Amy Dickson, Jonathan Biss, Vadin Gluzman, Alisa Weilerstein, Christian Tetzlaff, Jayson Gillham and Nelson Freire are among the other high-powered solo musicians.

Among the more overtly populist concerts will be legendary American trumpeter and bandleader Wynton Marsalis who will both showcase his Jazz at Lincoln Centre Orchestra and combine with the SSO for a performance of his own Swing Symphony. Other American work will feature British conductor John Wilson playing Hollywood film scores and then crossing the Atlantic for a night of British music.

^{Wynton Marsalis (left, back row of trumpeters) & his Jazz Orchestra}

In a new first, the SSO’s impressive line up of new commissions are complemented by the appointment of Brett Dean as its first ever Artist in Residence, serving for three years from 2016, who has curated a series of contemporary concert performances at Carriageworks.

To learn more about the thinking behind what looks set to be an especially exciting 2016, Limelight caught up with David Robertson to chat about the programme in more depth. You can read all about it here.

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