A musical partner worth keeping around

When it comes to those artist biographies that you see in the back of programs, every singer, violinist and conductor seems to be "in demand." But for the British musician Thomas Ades, that overused phrase is entirely accurate. With a thriving career as composer, conductor and pianist, there's not a lot of Ades left to go around. That's why it was a smart move by the Boston Symphony Orchestra back in 2016 to launch a three-year artistic partnership with him.

"They're very familiar with new work, and also have powerful roots in traditional romantic repertoire and there's a continuity that's very strong between them. As a composer, that's what we look for," says Ades.

The BSO first played an Ades composition in 1999 ("Living Toys") and he made his conducting debut in Symphony Hall in 2011 leading scenes from his opera "The Tempest." With or without Ades on the podium, the BSO has played something by Ades every year since. But the pace of collaborations really picked up once the partnership began. A highlight came this past March when pianist Kirill Gerstein premiered Ades' Piano Concerto in Boston where it was also recorded.

"I think we're continuing the association after 2019," Ades told me. "We're going to go on working together. We're all very happy with the arrangement and are still cooking things up."

Tanglewood continues to be a part of the mix. Coming up next Sunday, Aug. 11, Ades leads the BSO in Beethoven's Symphony No. 6 "Pastoral" and the Piano Concerto No. 4 with soloist Inon Barnatan. Also on that program is Ives' Three Places in New England, which includes a movement titled "The Housatonic at Stockbridge." Linking together the Beethoven Sixth and the Ives, Ades says,"They're the two greatest depictions of rivers."

This will also be Ades' second consecutive summer as director of the Tanglewood Festival of...