On July 19^th and 20^th, 89-year-old maestro Zubin Mehta will visit the NCPA for the second time in 2025. This time, he will lead the Orchestra del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino in two contrasting programmes featuring Italian opera excerpts and German-Austrian classics.

Born in India, Zubin Mehta is one of the greatest conductors of our time. He has not only delivered countless performances that will be remembered by history, but has also developed a close connection with the NCPA over the years, becoming a long-standing friend of the venue. He has previously led the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra (2009), the Orquestra De La Comunitat Valenciana (2014), and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra (2014, 2016) at the NCPA. In 2015, he conducted the China NCPA Orchestra and Chorus in Verdi’s Aida, later describing it as the finest performance of the opera in his career. This February, Maestro Mehta stepped in for the ailing Daniel Barenboim to conduct the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra at the NCPA. It became a much-told story in the music world that Mehta, at 89, came to rescue Daniel Barenboim who is just 83 years old.

On the podium, Zubin Mehta embodies the classic German-Austrian conducting style–a result of his training under Hans Swarowsky at the Vienna Conservatory. His gestures are not overly dramatic, but always clear, precise, and elegant–an elegance he maintains even in the most complex large-scale symphonies. Mehta first rose to fame for his refined interpretations of Austro-German symphonic repertoire. He is known for drawing a unified, well-balanced sound from the entire orchestra, a quality that makes him especially popular among musicians. At the same time, his ability to highlight the drama and dynamic tension within music is a distinctive hallmark of his style.

The Orchestra del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino is the most important orchestra of Mehta’s later career. He has served as its Principal Conductor since 1985, marking nearly 40 years of close collaboration. It is the orchestra he knows best and works with most seamlessly–unlike February’s “West-Eastern Divan Orchestra”, this is Mehta’s core ensemble. Notably, they performed in the famed “Three Tenors’ Concert” and the Turandot production at the Imperial Ancestral Temple, showcasing both artistic excellence and broad appeal. In addition, Mehta’s rendition of Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 3, which he will interpret with Chinese pianist AN Tianxu, is also highly anticipated.

Zubin Mehta’s interpretations of German-Austrian classics and Italian opera are exemplary. The July 19^th concert, titled Echoes of Destiny, centers on the theme of “destiny”. The first half features selected opera excerpts from Verdi: the overture to Les Vêpres siciliennes evokes the epic resistance of the Sicilian people; the ballet music from Aida portrays the emotional entanglements of the ancient Egyptian palace; and the overture to La forza del destino explores the “inescapable force” of destiny. The second half presents Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5, a profound philosophical reflection on the asperity and glory of life. The July 20^th concert, “German-Austrian Romance”, will showcase magnificent German Romantic melodies through Beethoven’s Leonore Overture No. 3, his Piano Concerto No. 3, and Brahms’s Symphony No. 1 in C Minor.