This is the fall of absences. New York City Opera is skipping the 2008–09 season, the better to renovate the New York State Theater, and also the better to roar back into business with a brave new manager (Gérard Mortier) and a crazily ambitious program the following year. Alice Tully Hall is quiet, too, until February, when it returns with a new look and—dare we hope?—the warmer sound its patrons have been craving since opening day in 1969.

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