Tanglewood's Announces Performer Changes for 2022 Season

Among the changes, Leonidas Kavakos will step in for Pamela Frank on August 7

As the summer home of the Boston Symphony Orchestra since 1937, the Tanglewood Music Center, in western Massachusetts, presents its 2022 season with an impressive line-up of artists. Due to some unfortunate circumstances, however, artists have had to step down.

For example, for tonight's opening night concert, French pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet has withdrawn following a death in the family. He will be replaced by pianist Yuja Wang.

A regular performer at Tanglewood since 1992, Thibaudet was set to appear in Leonard Bernstein's Symphony No. 2 "The Age of Anxiety," named for a poem of the same title by W. H. Auden. With Wang stepping in, however, the program will instead feature Franz Liszt's first piano concerto.

Bernstein will nonetheless remain represented: the concert will begin with his piece Opening Prayer, a setting of a Hebrew benediction, which will be sung by baritone Jack Canfield. Rounding out the program is Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring, with conductor Andris Nelsons at the helm.

"Absolutely thrilled to head to Tanglewood and play Franz Liszt’s Piano Concerto No. 1 for the Opening Night concert with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and Andris Nelsons," Wang wrote on social media. "My thoughts are with my colleague Jean-Yves Thibaudet who had to withdraw from Tanglewood this weekend due to a death in the family."

Further into the summer, on August 7, violinist Leonidas Kavakos will step in for Pamela Frank who had to withdraw due to ongoing complications from COVID-19.

She was to perform Mozart's Sinfonia concertante, which Kavakos will keep in the program. The rest of the program with the Bostom Symphony Orchestra and conductor Thomas Adès will include the latter's Shanty - Over the Sea and Holst's The Planets. 

To see Tanglewood's full lineup this summer, click here.