Gustavo Dudamel - the charismatic conductor from Venezuela returns to Vienna for a matinee with the Vienna Philharmonic. A brief summary of Dudamel's rise: The "Sistema de Orquestas" was set up to allow children of all social levels to learn a musical instrument and play in an ensemble. Some of the Sistema's finest players were picked to form the Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra and conducting is the Sistema's most celebrated alumnus, Gustavo Dudamel, born in 1981. The young maestro, who was appointed chief conductor of the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra in 2007, is, in the words of the Salzburg Festival's music director, "the most charismatic conductor since Leonard Bernstein." After his successfull "summer night concert" from the Schönbrunn Palace Gustavo Dudamel became the youngest conductor of the Vienna Philharmonic's New Year's Concert.

The Subscription Concerts: When Otto Nicolai left Vienna permanently in 1847, the young enterprise of the Vienna Philharmonic almost collapsed, having lost in one person not only its artistic but also its administrative leader. Twelve years of stagnation followed before a new innovation brought about the long-awaited change of fortune. On January 15, 1860, the first of four subscription concerts took place in the Kärntnertortheater under the baton of then opera director Carl Eckert, and since that time, the "Philharmonic Concerts" have been staged without interruption. The only significant change in all those years was to switch from having one conductor for a complete season of subscription concerts to the present system of having various guest conductors within a season.

***

Program:

Charles Ives
Symphony No.2
-- Pause --
Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Symphony No. 4 in F minor, op. 36