Experiencing Alexandre Kantorow’s piano in person, the boundary of what it means to “listen to music” becomes blurred.

The sound is clear and shadowed, yet it sinks deeply. Even when he plays with great force, the tone never breaks, allowing the inner structure of sound itself to be heard. As a result, one is not simply overwhelmed by emotion; rather, the sound is gradually absorbed into consciousness itself.　

The music moves beyond symbols or images and begins to resemble physical phenomena—light, heat, and pressure. It becomes something closer to witnessing than to listening, as if one has seen rather than merely heard it.

And yet, when it ends, there is a return to reality: silence, applause, and the simple fact that he was there.

Light and shadow, human draw.
Fragments oscillate between the tangible and intangible, like a puzzle; each piece found along the way becomes a pearl. Habits, gestures, affect, and bizarrerie—everything fits onto a single chair. Touch melancholy notes sweetly and delicately. Look again and again. At Carnegie Hall, I found the melancholy notes Amandine Beyer has been searching for.

On April 10, the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Andris Nelsons presented their second Carnegie Hall program, moving across contrasting sonic worlds while revealing a unified orchestral identity. Outi Tarkiainen’s Day Night Day opened with delicate, transparent sonorities evoking Arctic light and nature; the music unfolded like a shifting landscape, as if sound itself became scenery. Grieg’s Piano Concerto followed, combining Romantic brilliance with folkloric energy, where piano and orchestra formed a flowing narrative balancing virtuosity and lyrical clarity. The program closed with Sibelius’s Symphony No. 1, a tightly structured, highly focused work whose intensity and coherence generated a strong sense of momentum from beginning to end.

The Boston Symphony Orchestra and Andris Nelsons at Carnegie Hall on 4.9.2026. The concert becomes a study in contrast: from verbal density and rhythmic pressure to expansive lyricism and structural clarity. Even after Nelsons left following the fourth curtain call, the orchestra remained on stage; for a fifth call, he returned, closing the evening in a shared gesture with the audience. The prolonged ovation underscored the sense that Nelsons and the Boston Symphony are central to this musical vision.

On 3.15.2026 at Zankel Hall, Tabea Zimmermann and Javier Perianes offered a luminous recital. From Schumann’s expressive early works to Brahms’s intimate Viola Sonata, Britten’s reflective Lachrymae, and Shostakovich’s late Sonata, their playing was passionate, nuanced, and deeply human.

On March 10, 2026, at Carnegie Hall, Yannick Nézet-Séguin led the Philadelphia Orchestra in Mahler’s Symphony No. 2. From anxious violins to radiant brass, each movement shimmered with detail. Joyce DiDonato’s mezzo soared in Urlicht, and the Resurrection finale proclaimed, “Rise again!” A vivid, masterful 90-minute performance.

Strauss’s Also sprach Zarathustra translates Nietzsche’s philosophy into music, using organ, harps, and tubas to depict sunrise, human longing, and life’s highs and lows. Steude and fellow musicians transform the piece through precise playing and dance, creating a transcendent experience. Sibelius’s Symphony No. 2 follows, capturing the breath of the earth, tension, and hope, with sweeping, cosmic gestures. Vienna 2026’s New York performances closed with Strauss’s existential questions and Sibelius’s natural imagery, and the encore waltz brought the three-day musical journey to a luminous, celebratory conclusion.

Wien and Nelsons at Carnegie Hall 2026, Day 2: from the gravity of Kurtág to Mozart’s elegant Vienna, and finally to Dvořák in a Vienna fraught with ethnic tensions, where the voices and dances of the local populace express strong national consciousness.

Wien and Nelsons performed at Carnegie Hall on February 27, 2026. The concert opened with Bartók’s Piano Concerto No. 3, with Lang Lang weaving each note with improvisatory freedom. Nelsons let the music breathe; the second movement felt tender, a quiet entrusting of the heart. The encore dissolved softly into space. Mahler’s Symphony No. 1 followed, with shimmering strings, resonant horns, and colorful percussion creating a cosmic expanse. Nelsons precisely unified veterans and young musicians, tracing a journey from Bartók’s inner light to Mahler’s vast currents, an experience where sound and silence intertwined, leaving the listener introspective and awed.

Since first hearing the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under Daniel Barenboim in the 2000s and later under Riccardo Muti, I’ve known the Orchestra’s power and elegance. But this evening, with 30-year-old Finnish conductor Klaus Mäkelä at the podium, Chicago felt freshly alive.