This October Thomas Adès joins the distinguished company of Kurtág, Ligeti, Messiaen and Stravinsky as a recipient of the prestigious Leonie Sonning Music Prize.
Adès will conduct the prize-giving concert which features the Danish National Concert Choir and the Danish National Symphony Orchestra in Asyla, America: A Prophecy and the Danish premiere of Totentanz. The concert marks the conclusion of a mini-festival in Copenhagen in which Adès performs alongside both the Danish String Quartet and the Athelas Sinfonietta conducted by Pierre-André Valade.
In an interview with Andrew Mellor, Adès commented: ‘Everything about it is amazing, but the most amazing part is the concert I get to conduct with the Danish National Symphony Orchestra and Vocal Ensemble.’ He explained that he would use the money to buy ‘time and space to think. It won’t be frittered away. It will be spent on something that will make it more efficient for me to work somehow.’
More details about the award can be found here