“We felt the New York Philharmonic should be of our city, about our city, and in our time.” Like every other arts organization, the orchestra is chasing the young (or youngish), and Deborah Borda insists the key is not to peddle outdated prestige or blandish with watered-down entertainment but to present art that is socially engaged. “Millennials are hungry for experience, but they need a different context, one that’s political and social,” she says.

“The poet who wrote the words can be confrontational. The composer is known for cutting-edge jazz. The singer specializes in ornately written operas from another century. Suffice it to say that Cycles of My Being, a new song cycle by poet Terrance Hayes and composer Tyshawn Sorey – prompted by police brutality against African Americans – won’t be anything typical. Or demure.” Says Lawrence Brownlee, who conceived the project for Opera Philadelphia, “Hold on to your seats. We don’t know what’s going to happen. But something is going to happen.”

Daniel Raiskin, an Amsterdam-based coductor who was until recently music director of orchestras in Koblenz, Germany and Łódź, Poland, takes over the podium next season from the departing Alexander Mickelthwate.

“Dr. [Ahmad] Sarmast founded ANIM in Kabul in 2010 in response to that country’s civil war destruction of centuries of rich musical tradition. In the 1980s the pop music and film industries were thriving in Afghanistan, with hundreds of ensembles and a national radio orchestra playing Western and Afghan musical instruments. Between 1996 and 2001, music was completely banned. Over the last eight years, ANIM has been providing a challenging and safe learning environment for all students regardless of gender, ethnicity, religious sect or socio-economic status. The institute has a special focus on the most disadvantaged children in Afghanistan, including orphans, street vendors and girls.” the other winner of this year’s $125,000 prize is the band Metallica.

“Empathy is, perhaps, the most plausible of music’s utopian promises. The universality of musical communication dissolves the barriers of isolated viewpoints. We can gain direct access to perspectives and emotions far from our own experience. Music expands our ability to empathize, to sympathize, to humanize. It’s a great story. It’s a story I’ve told enough times, certainly. And, at those times—now, for instance—when empathy seems to be a dwindlingly scarce societal resource, it’s a story we like to tell with greater insistence, and confidence, and hope. But what if it’s just that—a story?”