World Premiere of Zhou Long’s Men of Iron and the Golden Spike;

U.S. Premieres of Galina Ustvolskaya’s Symphonic Poem No. 1, César Franck’s What You Hear on the Mountain, Zhou Long’s Classic of Mountains and Seas, and Egon Wellesz’s Prospero’s Incantations; and NYC Premieres of Leonard Slatkin’s Kinah and Cindy McTee’s Double Play

Rare Performances of Honegger’s Rugby and Symphony No. 1, Mitropoulos’ Concerto Grosso, d’Indy’s Symphony on a French Mountain Air, and Vaughan Williams’ Symphony No. 7, Sinfonia Antartica
Guest Artists Include Conductors Tan Dun, Hans Graf, and Leonard Slatkin;

Pianists Anna Polonsky and Blair McMillen; Violinist Xinran Li, Soprano Paulina Swierczek, and Baritone Michael Nagy

Annandale-on-Hudson, New York, August 21, 2019  — The Orchestra Now (TŌN), the visionary orchestra and master’s degree program founded by Bard College president, conductor, educator, and music historian Leon Botstein, begins its fifth season on September 14, 2019. Five different series and three special events will offer 19 diverse programs and 31 performances presenting novel combinations of both time-honored and lesser-known repertoire through May 17, 2020. Since the Orchestra’s launch in 2015, the young members of TŌN have performed 261 works by 137 composers for more than 50,000 people in 23 venues, with 158 soloists and 15 conductors.

“As we look forward to our 2019-20 season and reflect on all that has been accomplished since the Orchestra was founded only four years ago, I am so very proud that TŌN has firmly established its place in New York’s rich cultural landscape,” said Music Director Leon Botstein. “Its achievements have been earned by offering performances of the highest quality, filled with the energy and virtuosity of its young artists, who demonstrate their gifts and their exceptional skills at each performance. With such a bright present, the future is undeniably promising.”

Highlights of the 2019–20 season include the world premiere of Pulitzer Prize-winner Zhou Long’s Men of Iron and the Golden Spike, a piece inspired by the thousands of Chinese workers who helped complete the Transcontinental Railroad in the American West. There will also be four U.S. premieres: Galina Ustvolskaya’s 1948 Symphonic Poem No. 1, featured on the opening night program at the Fisher Center at Bard on September 14-15; César Franck’s What You Hear on the Mountain—likely the very first symphonic poem in history—at the Fisher Center at Bard on April 25–26 (with the NYC premiere following at Carnegie Hall on April 30); Egon Wellesz’s Prospero’s Incantations—stirred by the character in Shakespeare’s play The Tempest—under the baton of guest conductor Hans Graf at Bard on November 2-3; and Zhou Long’s new symphonic work inspired by ancient Chinese classic text, Classic of Mountains and Seas, at Carnegie Hall on October 1. Guest conductor and Grammy-winner Leonard Slatkin will lead TŌN in the NY City premieres of his Kinah, an elegy for his late parents, and Cindy McTee’s Double Play, a work dedicated to Slatkin by the composer, at Rose Theater on March 22. 

Also notable are two Carnegie Hall programs offering the first NYC performances in over 50 years of Honegger’s Rugby and Mitropoulos’ Concerto Grosso (November 14); and Vincent d’Indy’s Symphony on a French Mountain Air alongside Vaughan Williams’ Sinfonia Antartica (April 30). A December 8 concert at The Metropolitan Museum of Art will mark the first NYC performance of Honegger’s Symphony No. 1 in 58 years.

The Fisher Center series at Bard College will offer programs ranging from an all-Beethoven concert in celebration of the 250^th anniversary of the great master’s birth to the U.S. premiere of Galina Ustvolskaya’s Symphonic Poem No. 1. The distinguished Carnegie Hall series will include one program of works from the 1920s and an evening titled Into the Wilderness that includes the first symphonic poem ever composed. Rose Theater at Jazz at Lincoln Center will host a concert with Academy Award-winning guest conductor Tan Dun and a second performance featuring Detroit Symphony Orchestra Music Director Laureate Leonard Slatkin conducting Rachmaninoff in addition to two NYC premieres, including one of his own. The top-selling Sight & Sound series at The Metropolitan Museum of Art returns with three programs exploring the connections between music and artworks about technology, chivalry and modernism. Four FREE concerts will be offered in New York City and beyond, including two at Peter Norton Symphony Space in Manhattan led by TŌN’s resident conductor Zachary Schwartzman: one program presenting Ravel’s Boléro and Stravinsky’s Petrushka, and a second featuring works by Liszt, Kodály, and Bartók. The appealing programming of these free performances is a great opportunity for families to experience their first orchestral performance and attract future generations to the joys of classical music.

The 2019-20 season will offer three special events. At Carnegie Hall, From the Middle Kingdom to the Wild West will roll out new works by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Zhou Long that evoke ancient and modern mythical geographies. The presentation is part of the 2019 China Now Music Festival and includes the world-premiere of Men of Iron and the Golden Spike, a work about the thousands of Chinese workers who helped complete the Transcontinental Railroad in the American West, and the U.S. premiere of Classic of Mountains and Seas, a new symphonic work inspired by the ancient Chinese classic text “Shan Hai Jing” (October 1). The program will also be performed at Stanford University’s Bing Concert Hall in Stanford, CA (October 6), and is presented by the US-China Music Institute of the Bard College Conservatory with the Center for East Asian Studies and the Chinese Railroad Worker’s Project at Stanford University. The US-China Music Institute will also present a special Chinese New Year concert featuring conductor Jindong Cai and soloists from the Central Conservatory of Music in China, at the Fisher Center at Bard (January 25) and at Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Rose Theater (January 26). In addition, TŌN will collaborate with Bard’s Graduate Vocal Arts Program on an opera-to-be-announced under the baton of TŌN’s Associate Conductor James Bagwell at the Fisher Center at Bard (March 6 & 8). 

This year marks the third season of TŌN’s successful broadcast series on WMHT-FM, the NPR classical music radio station of New York’s Capital Region, and the second season on WWFM - The Classical Network station serving New Jersey and eastern Pennsylvania, both featuring programs from the Fisher Center series. TŌN’s performance are also heard regularly on American Public Media’s Performance Today! This spring, TŌN’s second album with pianist Piers Lane will be released by Hyperion Records, featuring works by Sir Arthur Bliss, Edmund Rubbra, and Sir Arnold Bax.
TŌN welcomes a new class of 28 young musicians in 2019-20, for a total of 66 members in all. TŌN musicians hail from twelve countries around the world: Bulgaria, China, Hungary, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Mongolia, Peru, Taiwan, Ukraine, the U.K., as well as the U.S. TŌN musicians accepted into the curriculum take either a three-year Master of Music Degree Program in Curatorial, Critical, and Performance Studies, or a two-year Advanced Certificate in Orchestral Studies. Hundreds of candidates vie for the opportunity to rehearse, perform, and study with Bard College faculty, guest scholars, and performing artists, surrounded by the intellectual atmosphere of a liberal arts college uniquely suited to the task, at one of America’s most forward-thinking classical music centers.

CARNEGIE HALL SERIES, Stern Auditorium / Perelman Stage
The Orchestra Now returns to Carnegie Hall with Leon Botstein for a season that puts seldom-performed masterworks in the spotlight. The November program features rare New York City performances of four works, and in April, audiences can hear the NYC premiere of César Franck’s symphonic poem What You Hear on the Mountain, most likely the first symphonic poem ever written. 

Stravinsky’s The Fairy’s Kiss
Thu, Nov 14, 2019 at 7 PM
These four works from the late 1920s give insight into the evolving world of orchestral music 90 years ago. The evening presents the suite from Stravinsky’s ballet score The Fairy’s Kiss, written as an homage to Tchaikovsky and based on Hans Christian Andersen's short story Isjomfruen (The Ice-Maiden). Honegger’s Rugby is one of three movements from his third symphony expressing the horrors of war; the Swiss composer Othmar Schoeck adapted Gottfried Keller’s poem Lebendig Begraben for the song cycle Buried Alive to tell the story of a man who wakes up to find he has mistakenly been buried; and Mitropoulos’ 1929 Concerto Grosso—a Baroque musical format—was considered by the composer to be his best work. 
Leon Botstein, conductor
Michael Nagy, baritone
Honegger: Rugby*
Schoeck: Buried Alive
Mitropoulos: Concerto Grosso*
Stravinsky: Divertimento, The Fairy's Kiss Suite
*First NYC performances in over 50 years

Into the Wilderness
Thu, Apr 30, 2020 at 7 PM
This program offers a musical expedition that ventures Into the Wilderness. Vaughan Williams’ portrait of the mighty Antarctic drew its inspiration from music he composed for the film Scott of the Antarctic. The theme of d'Indy’s 1886 Symphony on a French Mountain Air was inspired by a folk song the composer heard at Périer overlooking the mountains, and was created as a fantasy for piano and orchestra. The works of César Franck, a prolific composer of operas, oratorios, symphonic poems, organ and chamber music, remain relatively unheard. This will be the NYC premiere of his beautiful What You Hear on the Mountain, which was written in 1947, before Liszt’s first symphonic poem of the same title, and may be the very first symphonic poem in history.
Leon Botstein, conductor
Blair McMillen, piano
Members of the Bard Festival Chorale
James Bagwell, choral director
Soprano Soloist TBA
César Franck: What You Hear on the Mountain (NYC Premiere)
Vincent d'Indy: Symphony on a French Mountain Air*
Vaughan Williams: Symphony No. 7, Sinfonia Antartica*
*First NYC performances in over 50 years

Tickets priced at $25–$60 are available online at carnegiehall.org, by calling CarnegieCharge at 212.247.7800, or at the Carnegie Hall box office at 57th & Seventh.

ROSE THEATER SERIES
The Orchestra Now presents two concerts in Rose Theater at Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Frederick P. Rose Hall. Tan Dun, world-renowned composer, conductor, and Dean of the Bard College Conservatory of Music, will take the podium for the first concert (Dec 15, details TBA). Guest conductor Leonard Slatkin will lead a performance highlighted by two NYC premieres, including his own work, Kinah.

Slatkin Conducts Rachmaninoff
Sun, Mar 22, 2020 at 3 PM
Grammy-winner Leonard Slatkin, Music Director Laureate of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, conducts the NYC premiere of an elegy to his late parents, along with Rachmaninoff’s hauntingly beautiful second symphony, dedicated to Russian composer Sergei Taneyev. McTee’s Double Play was dedicated to Slatkin and commissioned by the Detroit Symphony, which premiered the work in 2011.
Leonard Slatkin, conductor
Cindy McTee: Double Play (NYC Premiere)
Leonard Slatkin: Kinah (NYC Premiere)
Rachmaninoff: Symphony No. 2
Tickets priced at $25–$50 are available online at jazz.org, by calling CenterCharge at 212.721.6500, or at the Jazz at Lincoln Center box office at Broadway & 60^th, Ground Floor.

SIGHT & SOUND SERIES AT THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART

 The Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium
Conductor and music historian Leon Botstein explores the parallels between orchestral music and the visual arts in TŌN’s popular Sight & Sound series at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. This season the series will present three programs from October 27, 2019 through February 23, 2020. Each presentation offers a discussion accompanied by musical excerpts performed by The Orchestra Now with on-screen artworks, followed by a full performance and audience Q&A.

Strauss’ Don Quixote & The Last Knight
Sun, Oct 27, 2019 at 2 PM
Emperor Maximilian I of Austria, often referred to as “the last knight,” was passionate about the exploration of chivalry and armor. There is no more influential tale of knighthood than Cervantes’ Don Quixote, which inspired Strauss’ “Fantastic Variations on a Theme of Knightly Character,” the composer’s moving musical realization of Quixote’s chivalric journey.
Leon Botstein, conductor
Lucas Button, cello
Leonardo Vásquez Chacón, viola
R. Strauss: Don Quixote
Artwork about Chivalry
Presented in conjunction with the exhibition The Last Knight: The Art, Armor, and Ambition of Maximillian I, on view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art October 7, 2019–January 5, 2020

Honegger, Vallotton & the Avant-Garde in Paris
Sun, Dec 8, 2019 at 2 PM
Composer Arthur Honegger and painter Félix Vallotton were both Swiss nationals who spent the larger part of their careers in Paris, where they became part of the avant-garde scene in music (Le Six) and art (Les Nabis). Both explored the intersection of tradition and modernism. Honegger’s first symphony mirrors the magnetism of Paris in the 1920s.
Leon Botstein, conductor
Honegger: Symphony No. 1*
The Artwork of Félix Vallotton
*First NYC performance in 58 years
Presented in conjunction with the exhibition Félix Vallotton: Painter of Disquiet, on view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art October 29, 2019–January 26, 2020
Haydn’s The Clock: The Intersection of Art & Technology
Sun, Feb 23, 2020 2 PM
Musicians, like their contemporaries in art and science, were mesmerized (often literally by Franz Anton Mesmer himself) by advancements and pseudo-advancements in science and technology during the second half of the 18th century. While Mozart poked fun at this fascination in Così fan tutte, Haydn drew inspiration from the advances in horology in Vienna and London.
Leon Botstein, conductor
Haydn: Symphony No. 101, The Clock
Artwork about Technology
Presented in conjunction with the exhibition Making Marvels: Science and Splendor at the Courts of Europe, on view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art November 25, 2019–March 1, 2020
Tickets priced at $30–$50; 3-concert series from $75; Bring the Kids for $1. All tickets include same-day museum admission. Tickets may be purchased online at metmuseum.org/sightandsound, by calling The Met at 212.570.3949, or at The Great Hall box office at The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

THE FISHER CENTER SERIES AT BARD, Sosnoff Theater
The Orchestra Now’s residency at Bard College’s Fisher Center renews with 13 performances of seven different programs, all conducted by music director Leon Botstein. Opening night features the U.S. premiere of Ustvolskaya’s 1948 work Symphonic Poem No. 1, originally titled The Light of the Steppes; and Strauss’ Four Songs with Canadian soprano Paulina Swierczek, a winner of Bard Conservatory’s concerto competition.

Copland & Strauss  
Sat, Sep 14, 2019 at 8 PM
Sun, Sep 15, 2019 at 2 PM
The Fisher Center season opens with Copland’s “Great American Symphony” along with a romantic set of songs that Strauss gave to his wife on their wedding day.
Leon Botstein, conductor
Paulina Swierczek, soprano
Galina Ustvolskaya: Symphonic Poem No. 1 (U.S. Premiere)
R. Strauss: Four Songs, Op. 27
Copland: Symphony No. 3

Sibelius & Shostakovich
Sat, Oct 19, 2019 at 8 PM
Sun, Oct 20, 2019 at 2 PM
Xinran Li, a winner of Bard Conservatory’s concerto competition, performs Sibelius’ moving violin concerto. Shostakovich’s tenth symphony is his first written after the death of Stalin.
Leon Botstein, conductor
Xinran Li, violin
Sibelius: Violin Concerto
Shostakovich: Symphony No. 10

Hans Graf Conducts Schubert
Sat, Nov 2, 2019 at 8 PM
Sun, Nov 3, 2019 at 2 PM
Austrian conductor Hans Graf leads TŌN in two pieces from his homeland: Schubert’s beloved Great Symphony, and a set of tone poems based on characters from The Tempest.
Hans Graf, conductor
Egon Wellesz: Prospero's Incantations (U.S. Premiere)
Franz Schubert: Symphony No. 9, The Great

Stravinsky’s The Fairy’s Kiss
Wed, Nov 13, 2019 at 7 PM
These four works from the late 1920s, including the suite from Stravinsky’s ballet score The Fairy’s Kiss, give insight into the evolving world of orchestral music 90 years ago. This concert will be repeated at Carnegie Hall on November 14.
Leon Botstein, conductor
Michael Nagy, baritone
Honegger: Rugby*
Schoeck: Buried Alive
Mitropoulos: Concerto Grosso*
Stravinsky: Divertimento, The Fairy's Kiss Suite
*First NY performances in over 50 years

Beethoven’s Eroica
Sat, Feb 8, 2020 at 8 PM
Sun, Feb 9, 2020 at 2 PM
The 250th anniversary of the birth of one of the greatest composers of all time is celebrated with a performance of Beethoven’s heroic third symphony.
Leon Botstein, conductor
Anna Polonsky, piano
Beethoven:
The Consecration of the House Overture
Piano Concerto No. 4
Symphony No. 3, Eroica

Into the Wilderness
Sat, Apr 25, 2020 at 8 PM
Sun, Apr 26, 2020 at 2 PM
A musical expedition featuring Vaughan Williams’ portrait of the mighty Antarctic and two French mountain treks, including the U.S. premiere of the first symphonic poem ever composed. This concert will be repeated at Carnegie Hall on April 30.
Leon Botstein, conductor
Blair McMillen, piano
Members of the Bard Festival Chorale
James Bagwell, choral director
Soprano Soloist TBA
Franck: What You Hear on the Mountain (U.S. Premiere)
d'Indy: Symphony on a French Mountain Air*
Vaughan Williams: Symphony No. 7, Sinfonia Antartica*
*First NY performances in over 50 years

Mahler’s Resurrection Symphony
Sat, May 9, 2020 at 8 PM
Sun, May 10, 2020 at 2 PM
The Orchestra Now and the Bard College Conservatory Orchestra join forces with the Bard College Chamber Singers and Bard Festival Chorale for a performance of Mahler’s massive composition about the beauty of the afterlife, one of his most popular works.   
Leon Botstein, conductor
Bard Conservatory Orchestra
Bard College Chamber Singers
Bard Festival Chorale
James Bagwell, choral director
Soloists from Bard’s Graduate Vocal Arts Program 
Mahler: Symphony No. 2, Resurrection
A co-presentation with the Bard College Conservatory of Music

Tickets priced at $25–$35; Five-Concert Series: all locations $120; Create Your Own Series: 25% off the full price. Tickets may be purchased online at fishercenter.bard.edu, by calling the Fisher Center at 845.758.7900, or at the Fisher Center box office in the lobby of Sosnoff Theater.

FREE CONCERTS SERIES
TŌN continues its series of free concerts at venues in New York City and beyond, providing families with an opportunity to attend their first orchestral performance and introduce a new generation to classical music. TŌN’s performances this season will include four performances of audience favorites ranging from Mozart and Mendelssohn to Ravel and Debussy with TŌN conductors Zachary Schwartzman and James Bagwell.

Ravel, Mozart & Midsummer
Sun, Nov 24, 2019 at 3 PM
Hudson Hall, Hudson, NY
Zachary Schwartzman, conductor
Mendelssohn: Selections from A Midsummer Night's Dream
Ravel: Le tombeau de Couperin
Mozart: Symphony No. 39

Boléro & Petrushka
Sun, Feb 16, 2020 at 4 PM
Peter Norton Symphony Space, NYC
Zachary Schwartzman, conductor
Debussy: Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun
Messiaen: The Forgotten Offerings
Ravel: Boléro
Stravinsky: Petrushka (1947)

Mozart, Bach & Mendelssohn
Sun, Mar 29, 2020 at 3 PM
Hudson Hall, Hudson, NY
James Bagwell, conductor
Bard Festival Chorale
Soloists from Bard’s Graduate Vocal Arts Program
Mozart: Regina Coeli, K. 276
Bach: Magnificat
Mendelssohn: Symphony No. 3, Scottish

Liszt & Bartók
Sun, May 17, 2020 at 4 PM
Peter Norton Symphony Space, NYC
Zachary Schwartzman, conductor
Liszt: Les préludes
Kodály: Dances of Galánta
Bartók: Music for Strings, Percussion, and Celeste

Tickets: These concerts are FREE, no tickets necessary, advance RSVP suggested. For concerts at Symphony Space, RSVP at symphonyspace.org. For concerts at Hudson Hall, RSVP at hudsonhall.org.

SPECIAL EVENTS
Special events during the 2019-20 season include From the Middle Kingdom to the Wild West, a Carnegie Hall program presenting both a world and a U.S. premiere of works by Chinese-American composer Zhou Long (Oct. 1); a Chinese New Year concert with Associate Conductor Jindong Cai at the Fisher Center at Bard and at Rose Theater at Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Frederick P. Rose Hall (Jan. 25 and 26); and an opera led by TŌN Associate Conductor James Bagwell at the Fisher Center at Bard (Mar. 6 and 8).

From the Middle Kingdom to the Wild West
Part of the 2019 China Now Music Festival
This program will offer new works by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Zhou Long, evoking ancient and modern mythical geographies. The concert includes the world premiere of his Men of Iron and the Golden Spike, a piece inspired by the thousands of Chinese workers who helped complete the Transcontinental Railroad in the American West. In addition, TŌN will perform the U.S. premiere of Long’s Classic of Mountains and Seas, which combines ancient Chinese traditions with modern Western technique. TŌN Associate Conductor Jindong Cai, a three-time recipient of the ASCAP Award for Adventurous Programming of Contemporary Music, will lead the Orchestra along with the China Now Festival Chorus.
The program comprises an open dress rehearsal at the Fisher Center at Bard (Sept. 29), a Carnegie Hall concert on October 1, and a performance at Stanford University in California on October 6. From the Middle Kingdom to the Wild West is presented by the US-China Music Institute of the Bard College Conservatory with the Center for East Asian Studies and the Chinese Railroad Worker’ s Project at Stanford University.
Jindong Cai, conductor
China Now Festival Chorus
Zhou Long:
Men of Iron and the Golden Spike (World Premiere)
Classic of Mountains and Seas (U.S. Premiere)

Open Dress Rehearsal
Sun, Sep 29, 2019 at 3 PM
The Fisher Center at Bard
Sosnoff Theater, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY
Free admission. No tickets necessary.

Tue, Oct 1, 2019 at 7:30 PM
Carnegie Hall, Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage
Tickets priced at $25–$60 are available online at carnegiehall.org, by calling CarnegieCharge at 212.247.7800, or the Carnegie Hall box office at 57^th & Seventh.

Sun, Oct 6, 2019 at 2:30 PM
Bing Concert Hall at Stanford University, Stanford, CA
Tickets priced at $32–$84 are available online at live.stanford.edu, by calling 650.724.BING (2464), or at the Bing Concert Hall ticket office at 327 Lasuen St. in Stanford, CA.
Chinese New Year Concert
Presented by the US-China Music Institute of the Bard College Conservatory
Jindong Cai, conductor
Soloists from the Central Conservatory of Music, China
Full repertoire to be announced.

Sat, Jan 25, 2020 at 7 PM
The Fisher Center at Bard
Sosnoff Theater, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY
Tickets will be available in December at fishercenter.bard.edu, by calling the Fisher Center at 845.758.7900, or at the Fisher Center box office in the lobby of Sosnoff Theater.

Sun, Jan 26, 2020 at 3 PM
Rose Theater at Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Frederick P. Rose Hall
Time Warner Center, NYC
Tickets will be available in December at jazz.org, by calling CenterCharge at 212.721.6500, or at the Jazz at Lincoln Center box office at Broadway & 60^th, Ground Floor.

OPERA TO BE ANNOUNCED
Fri, Mar 6, 2020 at 8 PM
Sun, Mar 8, 2020 at 2 PM
The Fisher Center at Bard, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY
Presented by the Graduate Vocal Arts Program of the Bard College Conservatory
James Bagwell, conductor
Tickets will be available online at fishercenter.bard.edu, by calling 845.758.7900, or at the Fisher Center box office in the lobby of Sosnoff Theater.

The Orchestra Now
The Orchestra Now (TŌN) is a group of 66 vibrant young musicians from 12 different countries across the globe: Bulgaria, China, Hungary, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Mongolia, Peru, Taiwan, Ukraine, the U.K., and the U.S. All share a mission to make orchestral music relevant to 21st-century audiences by sharing their unique personal insights in a welcoming environment. Hand-picked from the world’s leading conservatories—including The Juilliard School, Shanghai Conservatory of Music, Royal Conservatory of Brussels, and the Curtis Institute of Music—the members of TŌN are enlightening curious minds by giving on-stage introductions and demonstrations, writing concert notes from the musicians’ perspective, and having one-on-one discussions with patrons during intermissions.

Conductor, educator, and music historian Leon Botstein, whom The New York Times said “draws rich, expressive playing from the orchestra, founded TŌN in 2015 as a graduate program at Bard College, where he is also president. TŌN offers both a three-year master’s degree in Curatorial, Critical, and Performance Studies and a two-year advanced certificate in Orchestra Studies. The orchestra’s home base is the Frank Gehry-designed Fisher Center at Bard, where they perform multiple concerts each season and take part in the annual Bard Music Festival. They also perform regularly at the finest venues in New York, including Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and others across NYC and beyond. HuffPost, who has called TŌN’s performances “dramatic and intense,” praises these concerts as “an opportunity to see talented musicians early in their careers.” 

The orchestra has performed with many distinguished guest conductors and soloists, including Neeme Järvi, Vadim Repin, Fabio Luisi, Peter Serkin, Gerard Schwarz, Tan Dun, Zuill Bailey, and JoAnn Falletta. In the 2019–20 season, conductors Leonard Slatkin and Hans Graf will also lead TŌN performances. Recordings featuring The Orchestra Now include Ferdinand Ries piano concertos with Piers Lane on Hyperion Records, and a Sorel Classics concert recording of pianist Anna Shelest performing works by Anton Rubinstein with TŌN and conductor Neeme Järvi. Upcoming albums include a second release with Piers Lane on Hyperion Records in the spring of 2020. Recordings of TŌN’s live concerts from the Fisher Center can be heard on Classical WMHT-FM and WWFM The Classical Network, and are featured regularly on Performance Today, broadcast nationwide. In 2019, the orchestra’s performance with Vadim Repin was live-streamed on The Violin Channel.

For upcoming activities and more detailed information about the musicians, visit theorchestranow.org.

Leon Botstein
Leon Botstein brings a renowned career as both a conductor and educator to his role as music director of The Orchestra Now. He has been music director of the American Symphony Orchestra since 1992, artistic co-director of Bard SummerScape and the Bard Music Festival since their creation, and president of Bard College since 1975. He was the music director of the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra from 2003–11 and is now conductor laureate. In 2018, he assumed artistic directorship of Campus Grafenegg and Grafenegg Academy in Austria. Mr. Botstein is also a frequent guest conductor with orchestras around the globe, has made numerous recordings, and is a prolific author and music historian. He is editor of the prestigious The Musical Quarterly and has received many honors for his contributions to music. More info online at LeonBotstein.com.

Press Contacts
Pascal Nadon
Pascal Nadon Communications
Phone: 646.234.7088
Email: [email protected]

Mark Primoff
Associate Vice President of Communications
Bard College
Phone: 845.758.7412
Email: [email protected]