From the Bronx to the Battery, the classic arts scene in New York is never quiet. Here is just a sampling of some of the classic arts events happening this week.
Violinist Randall Goosby joins the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra for performances of Tchaikovsky’s violin concerto August 8–9 at Lincoln Center’s David Geffen Hall. The concert, conducted by Louis Langrée, will also include Valerie Coleman’s Fanfare for Uncommon Times, the overture to Mozart’s Die Entführung aus dem Serail, selections from Lully’s Le Bourgeois gentilhomme, and Kodály’s Dances of Galánta.
The Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra concludes its Summer for the City performances with concerts August 11–12, aptly featuring Mozart’s final symphonies. Langrée’s final concert as the orchestra’s music director will see him conduct Mozart’s 39th, 40th, and 41st symphonies.
The 42nd annual Battery Dance Festival, New York City’s longest-running free public dance festival, begins August 12, with performances running through August 18 at Rockefeller Park in Battery Park City. The opening performance, Young Voices in Dance, features new works created by youth groups Bowery Mission and Queensborough Community College through Battery Dance’s educational exchange program, Dancing to Connect. The performance will also feature an assortment of other works, highlighting choreographers and dancers between the ages of 15 and 22.
The Metropolitan Opera’s Live in HD Summer Encores continues August 9 with a rebroadcast of Rossini’s Il Barbiere di Siviglia (The Barber of Seville). The 2014 performance of Bartlett Sher’s production features tenor Lawrence Brownlee as Count Almaviva, mezzo-soprano Isabel Leonard as Rosina, and Christopher Maltman as the titular barber Figaro, who employs comic antics to assist the lovers in their elopement, away from the eye of Rosina’s guardian Doctor Bartolo, played by bass-baritone Maurizio Muraro. The performance is conducted by Michele Mariotti. A staple of bel canto comedy, Il Barbiere di Siviglia follows up its famous overture with a string of some of opera's greatest hits, including Almaviva's romantic serenade "Ecco ridente in cielo," Rosina's virtuosic showpiece "Una voce poco fa," Doctor Bartolo's patter song "A un dottor della mia sorte," and, of course, the title character's iconic and oft-parodied introductory aria "Largo al factotum."
Following last week’s performances at Bargemusic, violinist Mark Peskanov and pianist Sara Davis Buechner continue exploring Beethoven’s complete violin sonatas at Bargemusic August 12–13.
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