Previn to lead PSO in concert in New Castle

The occasion is the premiere of a harp concerto he wrote.

THE VINDICATOR

NEW CASTLE, Pa. — Andre Previn, former music director of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, will return to the area this weekend.

In a concert Saturday at Scottish Rite Cathedral, Previn will lead the Pittsburgh Symphony in the world premiere of the harp concerto he wrote for PSO Principal Harp Gretchen Van Hoesen. The program, which includes Copland’s “Appalachian Spring Suite” and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 4, will also be performed Friday and Sunday at Heinz Hall in Pittsburgh.

Music director of the Pittsburgh from 1976 to 1984, Previn holds both the Austrian and German Cross of Merit, was honored by the Kennedy Center for his lifetime achievements, and was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 1996. He has received several Grammy awards for his recordings, most recently in 2005 for his violin concerto “Anne-Sophie” and Bernstein’s “Serenade.”

Previn has also enjoyed success as a composer.

The Emerson String Quartet recently performed the premiere of a commission work in Carnegie Hall with Barbara Bonney.

This work and the opera “A Streetcar Named Desire” are among Previn’s latest compositions, which also include a work for violin and piano (“Tango Song and Dance”) and a violin concerto commissioned by the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Both works were written for Anne-Sophie Mutter, who has performed and recorded them.

During the 1999-2000 season, the Vienna Philharmonic performed the premiere of the contracted work “Diversions” and subsequently recorded it. Other Previn compositions include a piano concerto for Vladimir Ashkenazy; a cello sonata for Yo-Yo Ma; and song cycles for Janet Baker, Kathleen Battle, Bonney and Anthony Dean Griffey.

Previn is working on new song cycles for Bonney and Renée Fleming; a clarinet sonata for the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s Thomas Martin; and his second opera.

Gretchen Van Hoesen has been principal harpist of the Pittsburgh Symphony since 1977. She has appeared as soloist with the PSO on numerous subscription series, Pittsburgh Symphony Chamber Orchestra series, and on tour.

Van Hoesen gave the New York premiere of the Alberto Ginastera Harp Concerto in 1976 and the Pittsburgh premiere in 1978. She has been featured soloist with conductors Previn, Lorin Maazel, James Conlon, Zdnek Macal, Sergiu Comissiona, and Pinchas Zukerman and has collaborated with flutists James Galway, Bernard Goldberg and Jean-Pierre Rampal in performances of Mozart’s Concerto for Flute and Harp.

She has been a featured soloist with The Chieftans and also at American Harp Society National Conferences in Boston, Pittsburgh, San Antonio, Washington, D.C., and Fredonia, N.Y.

Van Hoesen is a frequent judge for national competitions of the American Harp Society and is currently president of the Pittsburgh Chapter of the American Harp Society.