With a career spanning almost four decades as a soloist, conductor, and Music Director of the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields, Joshua Bell is one of the most celebrated violinists of his era. For the Festival’s Gala, he and his 1713 Stradivarius will tackle an all-time favorite, Beethoven’s Violin Concerto in D Major. It’s a piece written in haste for a violinist with whom the composer greatly admired, and it soon became a cornerstone of the violin repertory. One of the reasons, its loose, lyrical structure—interplaying in narrative between solo violin and the orchestra’s rhythmic themes—which allows the soloist to present it in their own voice.