Around the World With Music
Stagehousemusic.com to Classical Music
PARIS
Danny Elfman’s Music from the Films of Tim Burton, www.viparis.com
Oct. 21 and 22
Classical storytelling enthusiasts can celebrate the three-decade collaboration between Danny Elfman and Tim Burton in this Emmy-winning production. Mr. Elfman’s film scores will be performed by a full choir and orchestra in tandem with Mr. Burton’s imagery, including original sketches, drawings and film clips from “Edward Scissorhands,” “The Nightmare Before Christmas” and others. The show, which has sold out performances in 10 cities worldwide — including four shows at Le Grand Rex in Paris — will return to that city at the Palais des Congrès de Paris.
HIGHLAND PARK, ILL.
Ravinia Festival, www.ravinia.org
June 3 to Sept. 17
This year’s festival will feature a Chicago Symphony Orchestra two-night performance of Beethoven and Sibelius with the conductor Susanna Malkki, an “all-Russian evening” with Krzysztof Urbanski and a splendidly cadenced version of Beethoven’s “Emperor” concerto with Kent Nagano. Longtime devotees will flock to Haydn’s oratorio “Creation,” conducted by James Levine, the orchestra’s newly appointed conductor laureate. Also notable are an appearance by the popular a cappella group Pentatonix, the Ravinia debut of John Mellencamp and performances by the Lucerne Symphony Orchestra.
ASPEN, COLO.
Stravinsky’s ‘Petrushka,’
Aug. 16
Stravinsky’s “Petrushka” of 1947 epitomizes enchantment, the theme of this season’s Aspen Music Festival and School, as it depicts puppets come to life — one of them agonizing over the failure to lure a ballerina in the shadow of a high trumpet solo. The piece will follow Steve Mackey’s “Urban Ocean” and Haydn’s Violin Concerto in C major. Conducted by Hugh Wolff, an alumnus of the Aspen school, the Aspen Philharmonic Orchestra’s performances are known to be both sumptuous and wild, drawing crowds around the open-sided Benedict Music Tent, whose curving roof is made of the same Teflon-coated fiberglass as the canopies at Denver International Airport.
TOKYO
Bach Odyssey, www.kioi-hall.or.jp
Sept. 13 and 14
As part of her continuing world tour of Bach’s complete solo keyboard works, the pianist Angela Hewitt of Canada will take the stage in Kioi Hall. Ms. Hewitt, considered one of the world’s leading interpreters of Bach’s piano works, will offer a full cycle of 12 recitals in the space, mirroring similar programs in New York, Ottawa and London. Known for her nuance and control, Ms. Hewitt plays with a lightness that will draw even casual listeners to seats where they can carefully watch her fingertips.
LOS ANGELES
Mozart 1791, Conducted by Gustavo Dudamel, www.laphil.com
Select dates Sept. 29 to Oct. 8
This three-program season opener covers works from the final year of Mozart’s life, including his last piano concerto and the choral works “Ave Verum Corpus” and the rarely performed “Little Masonic Cantata” for men’s voices; a night of chamber music; and highlights from the transcendent opera “The Magic Flute.” The series, performed by the Los Angeles Philharmonic in the Walt Disney Concert Hall, hints ruefully at the masterpieces Mozart might have produced if he had lived beyond the age of 35. The conductor Gustavo Dudamel, who directs the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra of Venezuela, is known for bringing flair to the classics.
HAMBURG, GERMANY
‘Batman meets Alice’ at Hollywood in Hamburg, www.elbphilharmonie.de
Sept. 30
This season’s Hollywood in Hamburg series will honor the composers Danny Elfman, David Arnold and John Powell in one of the world’s most advanced acoustic chambers, Elbphilharmonie. “Batman meets Alice,” the first part in the series, to be performed by the Czech National Symphony Orchestra and Choir and conducted by John Mauceri, will give insight into the process and techniques behind Mr. Elfman’s scores for “Alice in Wonderland” and “Batman.” The program will also include the German premiere — and only the second performance anywhere — of Mr. Elfman’s first violin concerto, written for Sandy Cameron. Mr. Arnold’s work will be honored next March in “The Sound of James Bond,” and Mr. Powell’s animation scores next June in “‘Ice Age’ and Beyond.”
LONDON
The Proms, www.bbc.co.uk/proms
July 14 to Sept. 9
In late summer, “prommers” will clamor for a place to stand in what aficionados have called the mosh pit for classical music. Highlights of this season’s promenade concerts will include jazz tributes to Ella Fitzgerald and Dizzy Gillespie on the centenaries of their births, and the “Beyond the Score” commentary of Dvorak’s eerie “New World Symphony” — adding actors and projections to a full musical performance by Sir Mark Elder and the Hallé orchestra. The “Last Night of the Proms” performances will be conducted for the third time by Sakari Oramo, the chief conductor of BBC Symphony Orchestra, and led by the soprano Nina Stemme at the Royal Albert Hall.
‘La Bohème,’ www.roh.org.uk
Sept. 23
This Covent Garden performance will be the first new production of “La Bohème” for the Royal Opera House since 1974. Led by Sir Antonio Pappano, the opera house’s music director, and the acclaimed British stage director Richard Jones, this romantic Puccini opera depicts the 19th-century love affair between a poor French poet and a seamstress. Michael Fabiano will sing the role of Rodolfo and Simona Mihai will sing that of Mimì — together expected to emote the raw turbulence of the narrative.
SANTA FE, N.M.
‘The (R)evolution of Steve Jobs,’ www.santafeopera.org
Select dates July 22 to Aug. 25
Mason Bates’s exalted style is a rich blend of opera and electronics, melting the boundaries of classical music and ushering it into the digital age. It is fitting, then, that this work, with a libretto by Mark Campbell, traces the life of the king of the digital era, Steve Jobs, with clashing tones, as the contradictory figure learns that he will die before reaching his pinnacle. Mr. Bates gives a distinct musical hue to each character who influences the Apple co-founder as their voices cross and blend throughout the performance.
TRIESTE, ITALY
Kahchun Wong in concert, www.teatroverdi-trieste.com
Oct. 13 and 14
The conductor Kahchun Wong will make his debut at Teatro Lirico Giuseppe Verdi in a program of Niccolò Paganini’s Violin Concerto No. 5 in A minor and Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 4 in G major (“Das Himmlische Leben”). Mr. Wong, the winner of the Gustav Mahler Conducting Competition in 2016, will be joined by the violinist Sergej Krylov. Fans will get to see Mr. Wong before he begins his tenure as chief conductor of the Nuremberg Symphony Orchestra in the 2018-19 season.
