Each year, the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra (TPO), Japan’s oldest continuously-operating orchestra (founded in 1911), provides its audiences with imaginative programming of repertory familiar and unfamiliar. The 2025 subscription season is no exception. Here we find such well-known favorites as Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony and Stravinsky’s ballet score Petrushka, and such little-known but worthy compositions like Elgar’s Third Symphony and Pizzetti’s Concerto dell’estate. World-class conductors, both Japanese and foreign, and prestigious soloists adorn the lineup. Let’s take a closer look at each program:

Text by Robert Markow


February


The TPO’s Honorary Music Director Myung-Whun Chung kicks off the season in late February with an all-Beethoven program: two major works completed in the same year (1804), published with consecutive opus numbers (55 and 56), and both “triples” in one way or another. The Triple Concerto has three soloists (piano: Myung-Whun Chung, violin: Hina Maeda, cello: Jaemin Han), which is rare enough in itself, but Beethoven’s example is in fact the only such concerto in the popular repertory. Another “triple” is this composer’s Third Symphony, commonly known as the Eroica. Not only is this one of Beethoven’s towering masterpieces, it is historically significant for a number of reasons. It was the longest (about fifty minutes), most complex, and most demanding symphony written to date. Early performances caused no end of difficulties for listeners to this “modern”(!) music. What a way to begin the season!






March


Andrea Battistoni returns for his tenth season as Chief Conductor of the TPO with a program of orchestral showpieces. Stravinsky’s immortal ballet score Petrushka portrays all the colorful bustle and infectious excitement of a Russian carnival scene in its outer episodes, and in between the private, sorrowful life of a puppet with human qualities. “A flood of joyous sound” was how one writer described Hindemith’s brilliantly scored Symphonic Metamorphoses, which are derived from piano music by Carl Maria von Weber. A Weber overture completes the program.



April

When Edward Elgar died in 1934, he left his Third Symphony uncompleted. Years later, Anthony Payne, another British composer, finished it for Elgar, and its premiere in 1998 won the hearts of Elgarians around the world. TPO audiences can hear the results of this highly praised symphonic quest when Tadaaki Otaka, Conductor Laureate of the TPO, who led the TPO on its first European tour in 1984, conducts the orchestra in a symphonic masterpiece of near-epic proportions. Soloist in Ravel’s Piano Concerto for the Left Hand is Izumi Tateno, who was also part of that 1984 tour.





May


The highly esteemed Russian conductor and pianist Mikhail Pletnev, speical guest conductor of the TPO, returns to Tokyo with Chopin’s E-minor Piano Concerto and Tchaikovsky’s Sleeping Beauty ballet music. Pletnev could easily play the solo part in the concerto, but he has given that role to Kanon Matsuda. However, Pletnev’s name is associated with the concerto in another capacity: he has re-orchestrated the score in terms he deems an improvement over what the twenty-year-old composer originally wrote. Pletnev’s name is also attached to Tchaikovsky’s score, as he has not only assembled his own half-hour suite of eleven numbers from the full-length ballet score, but has also created a sensational piano reduction of this suite.



June


Veteran violinist and conductor Pinchas Zukerman brings a program of music all written by composers in their mid thirties. Beautifully crafted, imbued with a gentle melancholy, Elgar’s Serenade for Strings was to its own composer one of his very favorite compositions. For the Haydn concerto, Zukerman puts down his baton and takes up the violin to perform the work as it would have been done in Haydn’s own day. The Jupiter Symphony, Mozart’s valedictory effort in the genre, represents the supreme height of symphonic craftsmanship welded to artistic inspiration. Its nickname seems absolutely appropriate for music that evokes images of Olympian pomp, nobility, grandeur, and perfect mastery of construction.



July

Min Chung, Associate Conductor of the TPO, has chosen an all-Tchaikovsky program for his appearance with the orchestra, specifically two of the composer’s most popular large-scale works. Tchaikovsky’s music largely reflected his personal life, which was by turns either hyperemotional and passionate, or reflective and introspective. These qualities are found in the Violin Concerto (violin: Mayuko Kamio), one of the half dozen most popular in the repertory, while the Sixth Symphony, the Pathetique, adds elements of dark turbulence and terror to the mix.



September

9月定期演奏会

Andrea Battistoni returns for one of the summits of the entire orchestral repertory in terms of scope, imagination, and sheer size of the orchestra. This is Strauss’s Alpine Symphony, a richly descriptive piece of program music, nearly an hour in length and demonstrating with spectacular effects Strauss at the peak of his orchestrative powers. To complement Strauss’s monumental mountain journey, Battistoni has chosen another “outdoor” work composed about the same time, the Concerto dell’estate by Ildebrando Pizzetti, which the composer called his “Pastoral Symphony.”






October

10月定期演奏会

Myung-Whun Chung opens the subscription, and he closes it as well. Three immortal classics constitute his program, all from the first part of the twentieth century. Right from its opening night on Broadway, West Side Story became one of the biggest successes in the history of American music. The symphonic suite from this show provides a ready-made synthesis of Bernstein’s “poem to New York” in all its moods: tense, restless, violent, sinister, energetic, dynamic, awesome and romantic. Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, from its opening clarinet “schemer” to its outrageously brilliant and jazzy conclusion, carries an identity indelibly American, infused with raw energy, jovial abandon, the clamor of a great metropolis and warmly sincere sentiment (piano: Makoto Ozone). Half a world away, Prokofiev wrote what became the most successful full-length, three-act ballet score of the century for a production of Romeo and Juliet, music filled with passionate lyricism, compelling rhythmic excitement, and a generous measure of comic elements. 


Release Dates for Subscription

TOP PRIORITY

Nov 22, Fri

PRIORITY

Nov 23, Sat/Holiday

GENERAL PUBLIC

Dec 10, Tue

WEB Priority Discount Release
10% off via the Web for a limited time (※Except for SS seat)

From Nov 23, Sat/Holiday 10:00 to Dec 9, Mon 23:59

Single tickets are available only in case we have remaining tickets after selling series tickets. The release schedule is as follows:

[TICKET RELEASE] 2025 Season Single Tickets February, March, April and May.
TOP PRIORITY Sale (PATRON・SUBSCRIPTION MEMBERS)=Dec 14, Sat 10:00
PRIORITY Sale (TPO FRIENDS)=Dec 21, Sat 10:00
WEB Sale=From Dec 21, Sat 10:00 to Jan 6, Mon 23:59
GENERAL PUBLIC Sale=Jan 7, Tue 10:00

[TICKET RELEASE] 2025 Season Single Tickets June, July, September, and October.
TOP PRIORITY Sale (PATRON・SUBSCRIPTION MEMBERS)=Apr 5, Sat 10:00
PRIORITY Sale (TPO FRIENDS)=Apr 12, Sat 10:00
WEB Sale=From Apr 12, Sat 10:00 to May 7, Wed 23:59
GENERAL PUBLIC Sale=May 8, Thu 10:00



Release date priority categories:

TOP PRIORITY For patrons and subscription members. Please contact us by phone.
PRIORITY For Tokyo Philharmonic Friends members. Please contact us by phone.
WEB Priority Anyone can purchase tickets at the Tokyo Phil Web Ticket Service at a 10% discount off the regular price during a designated period.
GENERAL PUBLIC Tickets are on sale for the general public.

Subscription Ticket Prices

Orchard Subscription Series 8 concerts

Type SS S A B C
Subscriber ¥96,000 ¥56,000 ¥47,600 ¥39,200 ¥30,800
TPO Friends - ¥50,400 ¥42,840 ¥35,280 ¥27,720
Single tickets ¥15,000 ¥10,000 ¥8,500 ¥7,000 ¥5,500

*Bunkamura is scheduled to be closed from early April 2023 until the end of FY2027 due to the redevelopment of the adjacent Tokyu Department Store main store site, but Orchard Hall will be open for limited times on weekends.



Tokyo Opera City Subscription Series 8 concerts

  SS S A B C
Subscriber ¥96,000 ¥56,000 ¥47,600 ¥39,200 ¥30,800
TPO Friends - ¥50,400 ¥42,840 ¥35,280 ¥27,720
Single tickets ¥15,000 ¥10,000 ¥8,500 ¥7,000 ¥5,500

Suntory Hall Subscription Series 8 concerts

Type SS S A B C
Subscriber ¥96,000 ¥56,000 ¥47,600 ¥39,200 ¥30,800
TPO Friends - ¥50,400 ¥42,840 ¥35,280 ¥27,720
Single tickets ¥15,000 ¥10,000 ¥8,500 ¥7,000 ¥5,500

Benefits of Subscription Membership

1
Exclusive reserved seats: You will be able to attend in the same seat for the entire season.
2
Special prices: Subscription members can enjoy the concert at a discounted price compared to purchasing a single ticket for the same number of times.
3
First-priority tickets: The earliest access to popular Tokyo Philharmonic performances, including Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony concerts.
4
Transfer to other venues: Members can exchange tickets for a subscription concert at another venue in the same month (not applicable to some venues).
5
Invitations to various events: Invitations to special events such as open rehearsals (may be cancelled depending on circumstances).
6
First priority right of continuation for the following season: We will give you first priority to secure your seat so that you can enjoy the same seat for the following season.
7
Discount tickets: 10% discount on tickets for Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra performances (some tickets may not be available)

How do I subscribe ?

select a series and a seating area, and access! (From Sat/Holiday November 23)

About Same-day Student Tickets

Student tickets for the performances we present are available for 1,000 yen at the ticket window of the venue on the day of the performance.
-Tickets will be sold only if they are not sold out in advance.
-Please check the Tokyo Phil's official website for ticket sales information.
-The tickets will be available only for the students who present her/his own student ID card at the time of purchase.
-No reservations can be made in advance.
-Seats are not selectable.


Please note that the performers and program are subject to change when unavoidable. The Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra will not refund or change tickets purchased, except in the case of performance cancellation (however, there is a venue transfer service available as a benefit of subscription membership).

Tokyo Philharmonic Ticket Service


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