Yuja Wang, Michael Tilson Thomas

A programme of

Ives ‘Decoration Day’ from New England Holidays
Beethoven Piano Concerto No 4
Tchaikovsky Symphony No 5

Young Chinese pianist Yuja Wang has been widely celebrated for her poetic, penetrating performances that balance clarity, detail and fearsome power. She’s the soloist in the San Francisco Symphony’s second Festival concert under Michael Tilson Thomas, performing the most touchingly lyrical of Beethoven’s piano concertos, whose simple melodiousness is the ideal match for her subtle, nuanced playing.

Tchaikovsky charts a dramatic struggle against fate in his powerful Fifth Symphony, which includes some of his most rousing, emotional music, and draws on the orchestra’s renowned expressive power and tonal brilliance. Tilson Thomas opens the concert with the atmospheric American celebration of Ives’s Decoration Day.