The tour is being announced on Monday during a presentation of Mr. Gilbert’s programming for his first season in charge of the Philharmonic. The orchestra also plans to play in Japan as a nod to the Japanese side of Mr. Gilbert’s heritage.

The Philharmonic said it would also visitAbu Dhabi, in the United Arab Emirates, whose rulers are busily importing Western culture. Abu Dhabi has a significant classical music series and plans for a new performing-arts center.

Mr. Gilbert’s first season comes at a time of major financial pressures for all musical institutions. The Philharmonic has not been spared. It has said that it expects a $3 million budget deficit this season. Orchestra officials say they have not compromised on programming for next season but are making cuts on the administrative side.

In Communist Vietnam, a freewheeling utopia of commerce compared to the hermetic, impoverished and tightly controlled North Korea, the orchestra will play at the Hanoi Opera House. Completed in 1911 during French colonial rule and modeled after the Paris Opera, the house has about 600 seats, according to its Web site.

The New York Philharmonic has been to 59 countries, by its count, but never Vietnam, nor, for that matter, North Korea before last February. That trip created an enormous amount of public interest and provided a rare glimpse of life in the country, or at least what the authorities allowed to be seen. The orchestra is looking at other Asian stops and Mumbai is a possibility, said Zarin Mehta, the orchestra’s president, but the recent terrorist attacks there could complicate those plans. Mr. Mehta is from Mumbai.

The idea to go to Vietnam, a rare stop for Western orchestras, emerged in conversations among orchestra officials after the North Korea trip. “It was so extraordinary that classical music became the center of attention,” Mr. Mehta said, referring to that visit. “We sat back and said, ‘What do we do to follow this up? ’”

Mr. Mehta said the presence of some classical music tradition in Vietnam played into the decision, as did history.

“This is a country that we felt as Americans that we owed a visit to,” he said “We had a big war with them. The country was coming back, and we felt it was a good thing to reach out to the people there.”

Mr. Gilbert said his Japanese family ties and frequent work in Japan make the trip very personal. His mother, Yoko Takebe, is Japanese (and a Philharmonic violinist).

The outlines of Monday’s announcement had already come out in a meeting that Mr. Gilbert, who takes over after Lorin Maazel ends his music directorship this season, had with reporters in October. They included a Stravinsky festival to be conducted by Valery Gergiev; commissions by the Finnish composer Magnus Lindberg, who will be composer in residence; the presence of the baritone Thomas Hampson as artist in residence; and a gala opening-night program with challenging works in place of war horses.

But other details emerged on Monday. Alec Baldwin, the actor, will host the orchestra’s weekly radio broadcast. Mr. Gilbert will lead the New York premiere of Gyorgy Ligeti’s only opera, “Le Grand Macabre,” in a semistaged performance. He will also conduct Mahler’s Symphony No. 3, HK Gruber’s “Aerial,” Schoenberg’s “Pelleas und Melisande” and Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis.” Over all, the programs tilt more toward 20th-century and contemporary music than in recent years.

In an interview on Sunday, Mr. Gilbert said that the works programmed for next year represent only a “small sliver” of a long list of pieces he wants to conduct, and that they reflect his personal viewpoint. “I don’t promise any kind of perfection in my programs,” he said. “What I do promise is that everything has been chosen with a human touch.”

Discussing the highlights, he said he had never conducted a Mahler symphony with the Philharmonic in eight years of guest-conducting it but heard many performances growing up as the son of two Philharmonic musicians. (His father retired from the orchestra as a violinist.) He called the experience of hearing the Philharmonic, which has a long tradition of interpreting Mahler symphonies, play the composer’s Third Symphony “life-altering.”

“Now being able do it myself with the New York Philharmonic is incredibly exciting,” he said.

“Le Grand Macabre” is important to do because it is one of the most-produced contemporary operas but has yet to be heard in New York, he said.

In other details, Vladimir Jurowski will make his first appearance with the orchestra as a guest conductor. Other guests include Kurt Masur, Riccardo Muti, Antonio Pappano and Esa-Pekka Salonen. Most of the soloists are familiar names, including Joshua Bell, Garrick Ohlsson, Gil Shaham, Pinchas Zukerman, Leif Ove Andsnes, Emanuel Ax and Yefim Bronfman. Others are making debuts: the clarinetist Kari Kriikku, the trumpeter Hakan Hardenberger and the pianists David Fray and Nicolas Hodges.

The orchestra will also present two programs in a new-music series called “Contact” consisting entirely of commissions. Marc-André Dalbavie, Arthur Kampela, Lei Liang, Nico Muhly, Matthias Pintscher, Sean Shepherd and Arlene Sierra are the composers, an internationally diverse bunch. The concerts will be held at Symphony Space and repeated at a location to be determined. Mr. Mehta said the orchestra chose a smaller hall because it did not expect to attract an audience big enough for Avery Fisher.

By Daniel J. Wakin - The New York Times - january 12, 2009