Los Angeles Philharmonic

"All this -- it's a lot of fun," maestro Gustavo Dudamel said Thursday night at the inaugural gala for the Los Angeles Philharmonic, regarding all the hoopla surrounding his arrival. It wasn't just Saturday's free concert at the Hollywood Bowl, his picture on city buses and the free Bravo Gustavo app for iPhone users. The pieces of confetti that rained down on concertgoers following the event at Walt Disney Concert Hall had his name printed on them in boldface capital letters.

Carrie Dennis, principal viola of the Berlin Philharmonic, has been named principal viola of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, beginning in September. A native of Saratoga Springs, N.Y., Dennis, 30, studied at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. She served as assistant principal viola of the Philadelphia Orchestra from 2002 to 2006, when she joined the Berlin Philharmonic. -- -- Chris Pasles

Pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard has canceled his appearances with the Los Angeles Philharmonic next Thursday through Sunday at Walt Disney Concert Hall on doctor's orders because of back strain. Peter Serkin will fill in with a slight change in program. Replacing Janacek's Capriccio for Piano Left Hand and Winds will be Messiaen's "Petites esquisses d'oiseaux" (Small Sketches of Birds) for piano solo. The remainder of the program, to be conducted by Christoph von Dohnanyi, will be the same: Messiaen's "Oiseaux exotiques" (Exotic Birds)

Bowl change: Pianist Andre Watts, who was scheduled to perform with the Los Angeles Philharmonic at the Hollywood Bowl next Thursday, has canceled because of tendinitis in his left forearm, the orchestra said. He will be replaced by Peter Jablonski.

A story John Cage liked to tell involved his teacher of Zen Buddhism, D.T. Suzuki: "Before studying Zen, men are men and mountains are mountains. While studying Zen, things become confused. After studying Zen, men are men and mountains are mountains. "After telling this, Dr. Suzuki was asked, what is the difference between before and after. He said, 'No difference. Only the feet are a little bit off the ground.' " Thursday night Gustavo Dudamel conducted the Los Angeles Philharmonic in Richard Strauss' "Alpine Symphony" at Walt Disney Concert Hall.

An awakening classical music giant has roared again. With Lang Lang and Yundi Li already in their mid-20s, the time has come for China to launch its next sensation if it intends to dominate young pianism (as it clearly does). Her name is Yuja Wang. She will turn 22 on Tuesday. Her first recording on Deutsche Grammophon (Lang's and Li's label) is scheduled to come out in April. She's gone from playing minor engagements to big-ticket ones in no time. She apparently dazzles everywhere she appears.

James Conlon -- whose fuel reserves have been compared to those of the Energizer Bunny -- has been locked in overdrive this week, launching Los Angeles Opera's first Wagner "Ring" while also observing the Mendelssohn bicentennial with the Los Angeles Philharmonic. He is no doubt thankful that the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion and Walt Disney Concert Hall are right across the street from each other. Actually, Mendelssohn is a great fit for Conlon right now since revisiting this composer could be considered an extension of the conductor's "Recovered Voices" project at L.A. Opera.

There are wildly popular pianists (Lang Lang), beloved pianists (Emanuel Ax), deeply admired pianists (Pierre-Laurent Aimard) and charismatic wizards of the keyboard (Marino Formenti). And then there is Martha Argerich. She is our pianist of allure. She doesn't come our way often, but when she does, well, it's almost always all about Martha. Thursday night, she played Ravel's Piano Concerto in G with the Los Angeles Philharmonic at Walt Disney Concert Hall, and it was mostly about Martha.

Baroque music without theories: What blessed relief. That's what guest conductor Herbert Blomstedt and the Los Angeles Philharmonic served up Friday at Walt Disney Concert Hall. In the bad old days, music was music, period, no matter when it was written and what the details of its original performance might have been. Then the specialists moved in, illuminating the field, to be sure, but also dividing it into do's and don'ts, which soon became thou-shalt's and thou-shalt-not's. Blomstedt and crew said the heck with that.

Before he became a conductor, Christoph Eschenbach was considered one of the finest pianists of his generation. But since he took up the baton in 1972, his solo appearances and recordings dwindled. Unlike Daniel Barenboim, his slightly younger conductor-pianist colleague, Eschenbach, 69, last performed a solo recital 31 years ago (in Munich). Yet at Walt Disney Concert Hall on Tuesday, Eschenbach concluded a satisfying Dvorak chamber music concert, with members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, by performing Schubert's final Piano Sonata (D. 960 in B-flat major)