New York’s new music scene, always aglow with the fervor of ongoing cultural metamorphosis, suddenly seems fully on fire.  In recent weeks, sensational concerts including new works have been given by Lincoln Center’s New Visions series, the American Composers Orchestra, and the New York Philharmonic’s new “Contact!” series, among others.  And it no longer feels as though these concerts are attended only by new music cognoscenti.  Lots of generally curious music lovers pile in, too (many of these concerts were buzzed up and sold out!), the result, in part, of indefatigable work done over the years by Bang on a Can and other institutions that have helped open new ears to new music.

The Philharmonic’s Contact! Series is an especially welcome newcomer.   Part of the new energy that has seized the orchestra since dynamic Alan Gilbert stepped onto the podium as Music Director a few months ago, Contact! made an auspicious debut last week in concerts at Symphony Space and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  The program for both concerts featured four new works that, mirabile dictu, one hopes to hear again; they were introduced by the orchestra’s engaging composer-in-residence, Magnus Lindberg: Arlene Sierra’s Game of Attrition, for chamber orchestra; Lei Liang’s Verge, for eighteen strings; Marc-André Dalbavie’s Melodia, for instrumental ensemble; and Arthur Kampela’s Macunaíma, for an ensemble heavy on percussion, including a complement of spring drum thingies meant to evoke the Brazilian forest.

If you wish you could have been there at Symphony Space or the Metropolitan Museum, or you were there and want to hear the program again, here’s your chance:  this debut Contact! concert will be broadcast on Sunday, December 27 at 2 p.m. on Q2, WQXR’s contemporary online classical music stream. (Listeners may access the broadcasts by visiting www.wqxr.org/Q2: select the Q2 tab on the Player and click “Listen.” The concert can also be heard on iTunes.)

And may we put another event on your radar?  The Contact! Series returns on Saturday, April 17, when Alan Gilbert will be conducting members of the Philharmonic, with baritone Thomas Hampson, at the Metropolitan Museum.  On the bill will be three world premiers:  Sean Shepherd’s These Particular Circumstances, Matthias Pintscher’s Songs from Solomon’s Garden, and a new work by young superstar composer Nico Muhly.

Composer-in-Residence at the New York Philharmonic, Magnus Lindberg.