STORY AND PHOTO BY KAREN BOSSICK

The Sun Valley Music Festival will kick of its 2022 summer season tonight—Sunday, July 24--with one of the greatest piano concertos ever written.

George Li, one of the most sought-after young pianists in the music world, will perform Beethoven’s “Emperor” Concerto at 6:30 p.m. Sunday, July 24, with the Festival Chamber Orchestra.

The concerto had been performed 215 times in Carnegie Hall by 2021, making it the most performed piano concerto at that esteemed hall. Critics have called it “a noble vision of freedom” and “the summit of all concerto music ever written.”

The concert, like all summer season concerts except for the Gala fundraiser of “Carmina Burana” on July 31, is free. Assistant Conductor Sameer Patel will lead a pre-concert chat at 5:45 p.m. near the Pavilion Lawn Paver Bar.

Other concerts this week:

• Tuesday—“The Lighter Side of Tchaikovsky and Schubert featuring Amos Yang, the Festival’s principal cellist, as a soloist playing “Variations on a Rococo Theme for Cello and Orchestra.” Look also for Schubert’s Symphony No 5 in B-flat Major.

  Peter Henderson will lead the pre-concert chat at 5:45.

• Thursday, July 28—Pianist George Li and keyboard player Peter Henderson will perform Schubert’s Fantasy in F Minor, a haunting piece in which “we hear Schubert’s soul pouring itself out like a nightingale,” according to one critic.

  Li also will perform Schumann’s Piano Quintet with Festival musicians.

  Patel will lead a pre-concert chat.

• Friday, July 29—Horn player William VerMeulen will and others will play such selections as Ravel’s “Ma Mre l’Oye” “Mother Goose” and Benjamin Britten’s Serenade for Tenor Horn and Strings.

Patel will lead a pre-concert chat.