An idiotic audience member’s smartphone alarm brought the entire New York Philharmonic to a halt Tuesday night in front of more than 2,700 stunned concertgoers at Avery Fisher Hall. Philharmonic conductor and music director Alan Gilbert was forced to stop a performance of Mahler’s Ninth Symphony. During the last movement of the monumental and emotional 82-minute work, an iPhone ringtone went off in the front row. “It simply didn’t stop,” a gobsmacked concert attendee told Page Six. “It wasn’t turning off.” Gilbert was then forced to halt the symphony, which grows quieter and quieter during the movement. Turning to face the Lincoln Center audience, Gilbert then announced, “Ladies and gentlemen, I apologize for this. Usually when these things occur, we ignore them. But this is such an egregious disturbance that I am forced to stop.” Gilbert then turned in the direction of the front row and exclaimed, “Would you please just admit it. It’s OK, just turn it off. Is it off now?” Some farther back in the audience then began to shout, “Throw him out!” and cheered Gilbert. The conductor resumed the work from the point where he’d stopped, and finished to a well-deserved standing ovation. Philharmonic spokesperson Eric Latzky told us, “Alan’s main concern was for the audience. And to have this most beautiful, and this most delicate, symphony stopped by an iPhone at its most vulnerable moment — [that] was what Alan was really concerned about, for the other 2,750 people in the hall.”