PREVIEW: February's Classical Music in NYC

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• Sunday, February 9 at 3pm: Orpheus Chamber Orchestra pairs Mendelssohn’s Octet with a rarer treat, the Nonet in E-flat Major by Louise Farrenc, a pianist and composer who became the first female professor at the Paris Conservatoire in 1842.

• Valentine’s Day could hardly be better spent than in Buttenwieser Hall, February 14 at 9pm, hearing the fearless, flawless cellist Jay Campbell, with Conor Hanick at the piano, in a daring program of new music. Three premieres: John Zorn’s “The Rule of Three” from A Brief History of Witchcraft, Natacha Diels’s Flight Patterns for electronics, cello, text, and video, and a duo by Marcos Balter.

• Jerry Herman, who recently passed away at the age of 88, will be celebrated by Lyrics & Lyricists in Jerry Herman: You I Like, conceived and music directed by Andy Einhorn and directed by Cady Huffman. February 22-24.

Carnegie Hall

• One of the highlights of our Beethoven year, Sir John Eliot Gardiner’s Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique gives us, in a series of concerts beginning Wednesday, February 19 at 8pm, a complete cycle of Beethoven’s Symphonies on period instruments. The First is first (on an exciting program that includes excerpts of The Creatures of Prometheus and the popular Leonore Overture No. 1), progressing chronologically with Nos. 8 and 9 on Monday, February 24 at 8pm with the Monteverdi Choir.

• Yuja Wang gives a recital — another fascinating, behemoth program including such varied works as Chopin’s Barcarolle in F-sharp, Berg’s Piano Sonata, Scriabin’s Fourth and Fifth Piano Sonatas, and pieces by Bach, Albéniz, Ravel, and Mompou — on Friday, February 28 at 8pm.

Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center

• While we bask in Beethoven’s symphonies on period instruments in Carnegie Hall, the composer’s more intimate side will be explored in Alice Tully Hall. CMS brings the Danish String Quartet — whose earthy tone and electric artistry made for a veritable “driveway moment” in an NPR Tiny Desk Concert — to New York for a complete cycle of Beethoven’s String Quartets. They play the string quartets in chronological order, February 7-18.

The Crypt Sessions

• Another option for Valentine’s Day is a harp and mandolin recital presented in the Crypt of the Church of the Intercession on February 14, (Wine & Food Tasting @ 7pm, Showtime @ 8pm). Bridget Kibbey, harp, and Avi Avital, mandolin, duet in a Bach sonata, Siete Canciones Populares Españolas by Manuel de Falla, Three Jewish Dances by Marc Lavry, and Joaquín Rodrigo’s Cuatro madrigals amatorios.

Metropolitan Museum of Art

• A collaboration between The Juilliard School, the New York Philharmonic, and MetLiveArts, Gertrude Stein and Virgil Thompson’s opera The Mother of Us All, a treasure of 20th Century American art that tells the story of Susan B. Anthony and the women’s suffrage movement, is given four fully staged performances in the American Wing of the Met Museum February 8 - 14.

The Morgan Library

• Skylark Vocal Ensemble and storyteller Sarah Walker present “a whimsical program inspired by classic fairy tales by the Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Andersen” called Once Upon a Time. Described as a “one-of-a-kind 'choral-theatrical' experience” including the music of Vaughan Williams, Poulenc, Thomas Tallis, Hildegard von Bingen, and Leonard Bernstein. Thursday, February 23 at 7:30pm.

New York Philharmonic

• The Mother of Us All (above) is part of Project 19, an initiative promoting female composers that hits full stride this month. Haydn’s Cello Concerto in C Major (featuring NY Phil principal cellist Careter Brey) and Mozart’s “Great” Mass in C Minor are performed alongside a world premiere and NY Phil commission, Tread Softly, by Nina C. Young. February 5 - 11, under the baton of Jaap van Zweden.

• Another world premiere follows: Tania León’s Stride, February 13 - 18, sharing the van Zweden-led program with Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier Suite and the phenomenal violinist Janine Jansen playing Brahm’s Violin Concerto.

• The next week brings yet another newly commissioned work in its world premiere, Ellen Reid’s When the World As You’ve Known It Doesn’t Exist, Feb 20- 22. Van Zweden leads a surprising program that includes Bruckner’s Fourth Symphony, Anders Hillborg’s Dark Harbor XXXV and Dark Harbor XI, from The Strand Settings, featuring soprano Reneé Fleming. She will also treat us to some songs by Icelandic musical artist Björk.

• The Cleveland Orchestra’s conductor Franz Welser-Möst makes a guest appearance at David Geffen Hall to lead the Phil in Strauss’s Symphonia domestica and the US Premiere of Jörg Widmann’s Babylon Suite February 27 - 29.

The Orchestra Now

• The Orchestra Now’s Sight & Sound Series continues with Haydn’s “The Clock:” The Intersection of Art and Technology” Sunday February 23 at 2pm, a pairing with the Met exhibition Making Marvels: Science and Splendor at the Courts of Europe.

Pit Stop Players

• Joshua Rosenblume conducts and curates marvelous and diverse programs with his group The Pit Stop Players. Their program called Remix — Monday, February 10 at 7:30 pm in the Leonard Nimoy Thalia at Peter Norton Symphony Space — includes David Shire’s ‘Manhattan Skyline’ from Saturday Night Fever for piano, four-hands, and violinist Suzy Perlman performing John Williams’ Fantasy on Themes from Fiddler on the Roof.

Pit Stop Players

SubCulture

Pianist Ian Hobson brings his sure technique and expressive tone to a complete Schumann cycle in recital at SubCulture. The first installment, Fantasy Pieces, Wednesday, February 19 at 7:30 includes two sets of Fantasiestücke and the ambitious Fantasia in C, Op. 17.

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