Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in Arabic Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.With two full seasons to go before Gustavo Dudamel begins his tenure as the next New York Philharmonic music director, the orchestra has an extended run of guest conductors. This promises some inconsistency and some exceptional nights.Their first concert of the season featured conductor Michael Tilson Thomas and pianist Emanuel Ax. If Mozart’s Piano Concerto No 14 and Mahler’s Symphony No 5 weren’t exceptional, they were still satisfying music-making. It was, however, exceptional to see Tilson Thomas. He is not only one of the great classical musicians of the past 50 years, but his every appearance is special. (He is suffering from glioblastoma multiforme, an aggressive and incurable malignant brain cancer.)He last led the Philharmonic in March 2023, with a gorgeous and affecting Schubert Symphony No 9. This evening he was as sharp and in command as ever with the baton. He and Ax are in a late performing style. The pianist has always been a sober interpreter with excellent technique and tasteful phrasing; the technique remains, but the concerto showed new ways of thinking.Ax’s thought processes seemed lighter, more agile. Each musical idea had a simplicity, and a sense of curiosity, that came through the piano. Mozart expresses multiple simultaneous possibilities, even ones that conflict — that’s the nature of music — and what makes a performance memorable is the sense that the musicians can hear and articulate this presence.That was Ax. Slight changes in accents in the minor-key development of the first movement deepened the feeling of constant dramatic transformation. The second movement was less cantabile but more romantic and it broadened the richness of the piece. The finale had the kind of aplomb and assurance that veteran musicians bring.The orchestra was crisp, though it took a few bars for the spirit of the music to kick in. This spirit was in them from the opening trumpet solo in Mahler’s Symphony No 5. Like Ax, this showed Tilson Thomas still finding new things in familiar works. He kept a fine pace — the Adagietto was 10 minutes and that felt ideal — and sought expressive power less in tempos and dynamics than in dazzling changes in tone and timbres. One has rarely heard such sensual colours in this piece.He had a superb handle on the form. The quasi-climax in the second movement of part one was strong but not too much, because the finale needs the biggest one. The balance between the three large sections depends on the middle Scherzo, and this was indeed exceptional, with conductor and orchestra traversing an enormous range of moods and vast distances between light and dark. This was lean Mahler, the emotional drama narrated in the third person, invigorating in the mind.★★★★☆lincolncenter.org
