An opening concert at Radio City Music Hall on Sept. 10<\/a> was hosted by actor Liev Schreiber and featured Lizzo, St. Vincent, Joaquina and Aaron Tveit. The celebration continued with an after-party high atop Manhattan in the Rainbow Room. <\/p>\n\u201cGustavo Dudamel is not an easy person to describe,\u201d Schreiber told the concert crowd. \u201cImagine if you added a teaspoon of Billy Joel, an ounce of Jean-Michel Basquiat, a cup of Tito Puente to a dash of Barbra Streisand.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dudamel shifted downtown the next day for a Sounds of Remembrance performance at the World Trade Center arts center for the 25th anniversary of the 9\/11 terrorist attacks.<\/p>\n
\u201cMusic belongs so profoundly to moments like this,\u201d Dudamel said softly. \u201cMusic cannot undo what happened. But when words can no longer reach where we need them to go, sometimes music can. It can give sorrow a voice.\u201d<\/p>\n
Subscription concerts started this week with Sergei Prokofiev\u2019s Fifth Symphony, which he conducted for his New York Philharmonic debut on Nov. 29, 2007. <\/p>\n
\u201cThere are not borders. There are bridges,” Dudamel said. \u201cA symphonic orchestra can also be immersed in a pop, folk, musicals. We are all in the same space. I think that is the message.\u201d<\/p>\n
Just a month into his tenure, the orchestra embarks Oct. 9 on a two-week, 10-show European tour, then returns in November to Carnegie Hall, its home from 1891 to 1962, for concert performances of Puccini’s \u201cTosca.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s this chemistry and passion that he brings to the table, which is infectious,\u201d said Sherry Sylar, associate principal oboe since 1984. \u201cWhen he\u2019s rehearsing, he addresses the orchestra as `My dears.\u2019 He\u2019ll start to give you a constructive criticism, but it\u2019s always with that as the address to the orchestra. Nobody has ever done that before. It just sort of changes the way you accept the criticism or suggestions.\u201d<\/p>\n
Celebrity beyond classical music<\/p>\n
While he usually has a car with a driver, Dudamel also walks around New York and takes the subway when there is heavy traffic, getting recognized at times. <\/p>\n
With his dark mop of black hair and Giorgio Armani conducting suits, Dudamel is so much the image of a 21st century conductor that Gael Garc\u00eda Bernal’s character for the \u201cMozart in the Jungle\u201d television series was patterned after him.<\/p>\n
Still, he is somewhat traditional: He prefers listening to music on vinyl records and frequented The Record Collector on Melrose Ave. in Los Angeles for additions to his collection. He thinks his first record was of Daniel Barenboim leading the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in Tchaikovsky’s \u201c1812\u201d overture.<\/p>\n
\u201cI love the sound of the LPs,\u201d Dudamel said. \u201cI destroyed some of them because I was stopping, because I was rehearsing conducting. My father was so angry.”<\/p>\n
Dudamel also maintains a home in Madrid and remains undecided whether to seek an apartment on New York’s Upper West Side, near the orchestra’s Lincoln Center home, or in the Chelsea neighborhood downtown. He’s become a fan of some of the city’s top restaurants, mentioning Cosme, Milos, Mercado Little Spain and Casa Ora, renowned for its Venezuelan cuisine.<\/p>\n
Repositioning the orchestra, on stage as well as commercially<\/p>\n
Ticket revenue for this season has increased by 8% through the same time last year and seats sold in September are up 20% vs. 2025. Subscription package revenue is at $12.4 million, rising from $11.3 million.<\/p>\n
One of Dudamel’s first changes was to move the second violin section from his left to his right, opposite the first violins, and to switch the double basses from his right to his left \u2014 a formation he used in LA. He’s shifted the entire orchestra closer to the front of the stage at David Geffen Hall and had their seats bunched closer together.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt feels like giant chamber music,\u201d violinist Alina Ming Kobialka said. \u201cIt\u2019s nice to have the brass and not 500 miles away from us.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dudamel has a five-year contract and will spend about 15 weeks with the orchestra each season. He began his first rehearsal on Labor Day, Sept. 7, with a short speech to the musicians, some of whom played in his New York Philharmonic debut.<\/p>\n
Dudamel recalled then music director Lorin Maazel took the unusual step to personally introduce him at his first rehearsal in 2007. Dudamel was aware of the orchestra\u2019s reputation then as a difficult ensemble.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was very afraid,\u201d he remembered thinking. \u201cI\u2019m going to be shaking for the very first few minutes. But at the end it was such a beautiful and wonderful journey,\u201d<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NEW YORK \u2013 Gustavo Dudamel jumped up and down on FAO Schwarz\u2019s giant keyboard during his first trip…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":349405,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[5301,24067,130600,61025,5184,130597,130594,71775,157,130595,16143,130599,74143,9110,130603,75078,24769,53890,130596,9,11,10,130602,39163,130604,129262,130598,130601],"class_list":["post-349404","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-9-11","tag-aaron-tveit","tag-alina-ming-kobialka","tag-barbra-streisand","tag-billy-joel","tag-bruno-walter","tag-daniel-barenboim","tag-david-geffen","tag-entertainment","tag-gael-garcia-bernal","tag-giorgio-armani","tag-gustav-mahler","tag-gustavo-dudamel","tag-jean-michel-basquiat","tag-joaquina","tag-leonard-bernstein","tag-liev-schreiber","tag-lizzo","tag-lorin-maazel","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-pierre-boulez","tag-sergei-prokofiev","tag-sherry-sylar","tag-st-vincent","tag-tito-puente","tag-willem-mengelberg"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349404","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=349404"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349404\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/349405"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=349404"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=349404"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=349404"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}