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Next season, the New York Philharmonic will be without a full-time maestro or a designate music director for the first time in decades.
But Gustavo Dudamel, the superstar conductor who takes over as the ensemble’s music and artistic director in 2026, will help fill the gap, leading three weeks of concerts, the Philharmonic announced on Tuesday.
Dudamel, who currently leads the Los Angeles Philharmonic, is steadily ramping up his commitments in New York. He is already helping to shape programming and tours. And next season he might begin to take part in auditions, though talks are still underway, said Gary Ginstling, the Philharmonic’s president and chief executive. Dudamel will also lead the summer concert series in city parks.
“This is how we’re going to introduce Gustavo to literally tens of thousands of New Yorkers across the boroughs,” Ginstling said. “When you look at the totality of that, it feels like we’re making huge strides toward his imminent arrival.”
Ginstling described the coming 2024-25 season as one of “experimenting and exploring.” There will be five world premieres, including works by Nico Muhly, Jessie Montgomery and Kate Soper. The pianist Yuja Wang will serve as artist in residence, and the dancer Tiler Peck will organize a series of evening programs. The Philharmonic’s musicians will create a program focused on the orchestra’s legacy.
Here are five highlights of the coming season, chosen by critics and editors for The New York Times. JAVIER C. HERNÁNDEZ
Pierre Boulez Centennial
The time that Pierre Boulez, the great French modernist composer and conductor, spent with the New York Philharmonic may have been short; he was the music director from 1971-77. But his legacy extends far beyond the orchestra, in ways that will be observed with a performance of his late masterpiece “Sur Incises” (Oct. 9), and a revival of one of his eclectic programs, of works by Bach, Schubert, Webern, himself and Stravinsky (Jan. 25). Both will be conducted by David Robertson, who led the premiere of “Sur Incises” in 1998. JOSHUA BARONE
‘The Ring Without Words’
The former Philharmonic music director Lorin Maazel’s 75-minute Wagner distillation “The Ring Without Words” has found a life beyond its arranger, but this orchestra has only done it under his baton, and not since 2008. His skillful quilt of the sprawling opera cycle’s major moments, which gives its players a Mahler-scale workout, will be entrusted this season to Nathalie Stutzmann, the music director of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, who was impressive leading Wagner’s “Tannhäuser” at the Bayreuth Festival last summer (Jan. 16-19). ZACHARY WOOLFE
Yuja Wang
The dazzling and indefatigable pianist Yuja Wang, who triumphed in a four-and-a-half-hour marathon of Rachmaninoff’s works at Carnegie Hall last season, tackles a new endurance challenge when she plays and conducts the Philharmonic in thorny and particular works by Janacek and Stravinsky, plus the jazz-band version of Gershwin’s beloved “Rhapsody in Blue” (Jan. 23-25). As next season’s artist in residence, she also joins Dudamel for two colorful concertos by Ravel (March 13-16). OUSSAMA ZAHR
Igor Stravinsky
Two great works by Stravinsky — the Violin Concerto in D and Symphony in Three Movements — heard more often across the Lincoln Center plaza at New York City Ballet will take center stage at David Geffen Hall. Patricia Kopatchinskaja, a violinist of startling originality and intensity, makes her debut with the orchestra in the concerto (April 9-11), alongside Montgomery’s premiere. Dudamel conducts the symphony (May 22-27) on a program that also features a premiere by Kate Soper, who, to up the ante, makes her debut as a vocalist with the Philharmonic. RACHEL SALTZ
‘The Wooden Prince’
Ivan Fischer, the leader of the Budapest Festival Orchestra, brings some of that ensemble’s vibrant disdain for routine when he guest conducts, so his Philharmonic collaboration with the equally committed violinist Lisa Batiashvili, in Mozart’s Fourth Violin Concerto, is something to anticipate eagerly. But the star of this program is Bartok’s grandly scored ballet “The Wooden Prince” — uncommonly programmed even in excerpts, and a precious rarity as it will be heard here: complete (April 25-27). ZACHARY WOOLFE
