Canadian pianist Tony Siqi Yun was the Gold Medalist at the 2019 First China International Music Competition. Pianist Magazine described him as "a true poet of the keyboard. Expressive, and with his own distinct voice, yet elegant and poised." He wowed the Aspen audience two seasons ago when he stepped in after a last-minute cancellation, playing a demanding program of Brahms, Beethoven, Busoni, and Schumann. He returns for Tchaikovsky's mighty and moving First Piano Concerto, one of the most popular works in the entire concerto repertoire. It got off to a tough start though, with the pianist Nikolai Rubinstein (whom Tchaikovsky hoped would play the premiere), calling it "worthless, impossible to play…clumsy, awkward…[with] only two or three pages worth preserving." In spite of this savage critique, Rubinstein and Tchaikovsky remained friends, and Rubinstein even played the concerto years later after it had received a wild ovation at its world premiere in Boston. Since then, this passionate and tuneful work with its catchy Ukrainian folk melodies has continued to thrill audiences.

After living in the United States, Paris, England and Germany after the Russian Revolution, Prokofiev returned to his homeland in 1936, motivated by homesickness and promises of state commissions. He composed his Sixth Symphony eleven years later, in the climate of post-war Stalinism. The work was initially well-received at its Leningrad premiere, but a month later, the political winds had changed, and it came under attack for being "anti-Soviet." The authorities were probably immediately put off by the somber opening of the first movement and the way the sarcastic little theme which follows is developed into something unsettling. The work's overall elegiac mood, Prokofiev's response to the war, was so at odds with Stalin's Union of Composers that it effectively ended Prokofiev's career. After he and his nemesis Stalin died on the same day six years later, the work was rehabilitated in the Soviet Union.

Opening the program is Jessie Montgomery's 12-minute Hymn for Everyone, based on a theme she'd composed during the pandemic in 2020, and then revisited the following year when her mother, Robbie McCauley, a respected, boundary-pushing theater artist, died at age 78. She describes it as "a simple piece. I meant it to be simple so I can explore the orchestration. There's a big brass chorale in the middle, sort of anchoring everything. It starts really slowly with the viola section and then builds as the piece goes on." After her mother died, she found that she had written a poem called 'Poem for Everyone.' "I didn’t know she had written it. When I made that discovery, I thought I had to lean into this a little bit more. I'd expand the hymn and make it into sort of a musical tribute. It was a bit of catharsis for me."

Thrill to the sound of the Aspen Festival Orchestra conducted by Emmy and Grammy award-winning conductor Xian Zhang in this emotionally rich program!

Please note these are working rehearsals and pieces may not be played fully, piece order may change, and soloists may not sing or play as fully as in performance. Also note the conductor is not mic'ed to allow the musicians to work together more freely.