Marin Alsop and Emanuel Ax

Artist of Distinction Emanuel Ax, whose performances here last season marked his 50-year history with The Philadelphia Orchestra, has some amazing friends. He performs this season with Yo-Yo Ma and Itzhak Perlman and in this set of concerts reveals a new concerto written for him by Oscar-winning composer John Williams, a piece hailed by The New York Times as “a work of extreme virtuosity ... episodic and hauntingly atmospheric.” This must-hear program ends in glowing light, with Brahms’s exalted Second Symphony.