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A Count goes hunting on a Sunday. A Musician (ok, it’s Berlioz) poisons himself with opium. According to the music, they both come to grief: one is chased by demons to eternity, the other is overwhelmed by dreams of witches and the scaffold. It seems wrong to enjoy their fates so much, but who can resist it when these wild stories have been given such exhilarating and evocative music?

Ravel’s piano concerto is just as thrilling – it begins with the crack of a whip and ends in a jazz-inflected whirlwind of notes. Fantastique!

FRANCK The Accursed Huntsman
RAVEL Piano Concerto in G
BERLIOZ Symphonie fantastique

Pinchas Steinberg conductor
Louis Lortie piano

Pre-concert talk by Yvonne Frindle at 7.15pm in the Northern Foyer.

AUDIO PLAYER LISTING

Track 1 – FRANCK The Accursed Huntsman
L’Orchestre de la Suisse Romande conducted by Ernest Ansermet
DECCA 480 0052
Track 2 – RAVEL Piano Concerto in G: 3rd movement (Presto)
Alicia de Larrocha, piano, with the London Philharmonic Orchestra conduced by Lawrence Foster
DECCA 476 235-1
Track 3 – BERLIOZ Symphonie fantastique: At the Ball
Track 4 – BERLIOZ Symphonie fantastique: March to the Scaffold
Hungarian Radio and Television Orchestra conducted by Charles Munch
PHILIPS 476 7962

Audio kindly supplied by Universal Music.

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Beethoven was the first musical hero and as far as some of us are concerned he’s the greatest of them all. His Emperor Concerto takes the heroic spirit of the Napoleonic age and turns it into music that’s muscular and commanding, wrapping the noblest of emotions in breathtaking virtuosity. It’s weighty music for a powerful pianist like François-Frédéric Guy.

Wagner’s Ring of the Nibelung brought together a whole raft of heroes in a massive cycle of four operas that begins in the Rhine and ends with the halls of Valhalla aflame. At 20 hours it’s too much for one concert, but Alexander Briger has chosen the orchestral highlights, beginning with the Ride of the Valkyries, for a Wagnerian musical adventure – minus the singing!

THE HALL OF HEROES
LEDGER Arcs and Planes
BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No.5 (Emperor)
WAGNER The Ring of the Nibelung: An Orchestral Suite

Alexander Briger conductor
François-Frédéric Guy piano

TEA & SYMPHONY - 19 MARCH
Short program: Beethoven, Wagner

You can also read our interview with François-Frédéric Guy.

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Track 1 – BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No.5 (Emperor): 1. Allegro
Track 2 – BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No.5 (Emperor): 2. Adagio un poco mosso
Track 3 – BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No.5 (Emperor): 3. Rondo (Allegro)
Radu Lupu, piano, with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Zubin Mehta
DECCA 66 6892

Visit again closer to the concert for more highlights from this program.

Audio kindly supplied by Universal Music.

Currently available from iTunes

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If ever there was a composer worth unpacking it would be Gustav Mahler, notorious for his enormous orchestras and large-scale structures.

So have Richard Gill and the Sydney Sinfonia bitten off more than they can chew? Come along and discover Mahler’s  more intimate side with two songs: ‘When my sweetheart is married’ and ‘The two blue eyes of my beloved’. A movement from a Brahms symphony gives the context for Mahler’s ambitious musical ideas.

Discover Mahler, and join us in 2010 for the first year of our Mahler Odyssey with Vladimir Ashkenazy: Mahler 1 and Mahler 8 (February), Mahler 5 and Mahler’sSong of the Earth(May), Mahler 4 (November) and Mahler 3 (December).

MAHLER Songs of a Wayfarer:
‘Wenn mein Schatz Hochzeit macht’
‘Die zwei blauen Augen von meinem Schatz’
BRAHMS Symphony No.3: 3rd movement

Richard Gill conductor
Samuel Dundas baritone

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Track 1 – MAHLER Songs of a Wayfarer: Wenn mein Schatz Hochzeit macht (When my beloved is married)
Track 2 – MAHLER Songs of a Wayfarer: Die zwei blauen Augen von meinem Schatz (The two blue eyes of my beloved)
Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, baritone, with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra conducted by Rafael Kubelik
DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON 449 735-2
Track 3 – BRAHMS Symphony No.3: Poco allegretto
Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra conducted by Kurt Masur
PHILIPS 476 2815

Audio kindly supplied by Universal Music.

Currently available from iTunes: Mahler

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Creativity makes us human. When Prometheus brought his clay statues to life it was the ancient power of harmony that turned them into thinking, feeling creatures. That might be a myth, but who hasn’t felt the civilising power of music?

With Beethoven’s Prometheus overture, the lyrical heart of Schumann’s concerto, and the impassioned Sixth Symphony of Tchaikovsky, this is a concert of deep sentiment and heightened feelings – music to take you beyond the everyday.

BEETHOVEN The Creatures of Prometheus: Overture
SCHUMANN Cello Concerto
TCHAIKOVSKY Symphony No.6, Pathétique

Alexander Vedernikov conductor
Johannes Moser cello

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Track 1 – BEETHOVEN The Creatures of Prometheus: Overture
Berlin Philharmonic conducted by Herbert von Karajan
DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON 445 112-2
Track 2 – SCHUMANN Cello Concerto: introduction
Lynn Harrell, cello, with the Cleveland Orchestra conducted by Neville Marriner
DECCA 442 8410
Track 3 – TCHAIKOVSKY Symphony No.6 (Pathétique): 1st movement (Adagio)
Track 4 – TCHAIKOVSKY Symphony No.6 (Pathétique): 3rd movement (Allegro molto vivace)
L’Orchestre de la Suisse Romand conducted by Ernest Ansermet
DECCA 480 0563

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Currently available from iTunes: Beethoven

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When Roy Goodman arrives in Sydney he’ll bring a 30-year reputation as a violinist and director specialising in baroque music, and that reputation has shaped the program he’s put together for us. Two magnificent baroque suites provide the frame and a baroque-inspired concerto from English composer Michael Tippett brings it up to date.

You’re allowed to ask where Edouard Lalo’s Cello Concerto fits into the scheme of things and we could jump through hoops explaining it: a French Romantic bridge between Bach’s French-style suite and a 20th-century concerto perhaps?

The truth is, this is heart-warming and lyrical music, and if you heard the rich intensity of Jian Wang’s Elgar concerto in 2008, this will be another chance to hear him play to his strengths. But in the end, Handel upstages everybody with his spectacular Music for the Royal Fireworks.

PYROTECHNICA
BACH Orchestral Suite No.4 in D
LALO Cello Concerto
TIPPETT Concerto for double string orchestra
HANDEL Music for the Royal Fireworks

Roy Goodman conductor
Jian Wang cello

AUDIO PLAYER LISTING

Track 1 – JS BACH Orchestral Suite No.4: Réjouissance
Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra conducted by Karl Münchinger
DECCA 458 169-2
Track 2 – LALO Cello Concerto: Intermezzo
Matt Haimovitz, cello, with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra conducted by James Levine
DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON 427 323-2
Track 3 – HANDEL Music for the Royal Fireworks: La Réjouissance
Berlin Philharmonic / Rafael Kubelik
DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON 477 6681

Visit again in 2010 for more highlights from this concert.

Audio kindly supplied by Universal Music.

Currently available from iTunes:
Lalo
Handel

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Dance the farruca, malambo, fandango! Hear all the colours of Spain when Miguel Harth-Bedoya, the Peruvian-born conductor, returns to Sydney with this exhilarating program.

Joaquín Turina leads the dancing with music that rises “like incense” and seizes the listener with its elegant fervour. From Argentina, young composer Esteban Benzecry reveals the colours of the Southern Cross in a five-movement suite ending in a red-blooded malambo. Manuel de Falla brings the music that made him world-famous: The Three-Cornered Hat – a high-spirited ballet that radiates sensuousness and virility.

Rodrigo doesn’t dance. But his much-loved guitar concerto blends the ardent flamenco soul with a rococo elegance inspired by the palace of Aranjuez. This is the music that sealed Rodrigo’s fate as the composer of “that concerto”, and Slava Grigoryan makes his Sydney Symphony concert hall debut as its soloist.

TURINA Danzas fantásticas
RODRIGO Concierto de Aranjuez
BENZECRY Colours of the Southern Cross
FALLA The Three-Cornered Hat: Suites

Miguel Harth-Bedoya conductor
Slava Grigoryan guitar

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Track 1 – TURINA Danzas fantásticas: Orgia
West Australian Symphony Orchestra conducted by Jorge Mester
ABC 438 198-2
Track 2 – RODRIGO Concierto de Aranjuez: 2nd movement (Adagio)
Slava Grigoryan, guitar, with the Queensland Orchestra conducted by Brett Kelly
ABC 476 8072
Track 3 – FALLA The Three-Cornered Hat: The Miller’s Dance
Track 4 – FALLA The Three-Cornered Hat: Final Dance (Jota)
West Australian Symphony Orchestra conducted by Jorge Mester
ABC 438 198-2

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Richard Gill isn’t going to gossip about why Schubert never finished his Eighth Symphony (no one quite knows, although scholars love to speculate). He’s more likely to show you how Schubert’s expansive melodies and long-range harmonies work together to create one of the most gloriously lyrical symphonic movements ever written. And we introduce a new work written specially for this series by young composer Phil Jameson.

Discover Schubert then hear the “complete” Unfinished Symphony in Dance of the Imagination in June.

SCHUBERT Symphony No.8 (Unfinished): 1st movement
JAMESON The Wind in the Hemlock (PREMIERE)

Richard Gill conductor  
Celeste Haworth mezzo-soprano

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SCHUBERT Symphony No.8 (Unfinished): 1st movement (Allegro moderato)
Vienna Philharmonic conducted by Georg Solti
DECCA 448 927-2

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Mozart and Stravinsky prove that musicians have never minded making a bit of money, even when they’re motivated by love and friendship.

A commission from a wealthy American music lover gave Stravinsky the opportunity to write his Bach-inspired Dumbarton Oaks. Mozart, on the other hand, knew he could do very well out of a windband arrangement from his latest opera, but he allowed a rival to beat him to it – and so we’re playing Johann Nepomuk Went’s highlights from The Abduction from the Seraglio.

The masterpiece on the program, though, wasn’t written for profit. Even though concertos for multiple soloists were all the rage, Mozart’s Sinfonia concertante gives the feeling not of cashing in on musical fashion but of artistic necessity. This one’s not to be missed at any price. Bring your friends. 

MOZART arr. Went The Abduction from the Seraglio –
Harmoniemusik
STRAVINSKY Dumbarton Oaks
MOZART Sinfonia concertante for violin and viola, K364

Michael Dauth violin-director
Roger Benedict viola

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Track 1 – MOZART Sinfonia concertante, K364: 1st movement (Allegro maestoso)
Track 2 – MOZART Sinfonia concertante, K364: 2nd movement (Andante)
Track 3 – MOZART Sinfonia concertante, K364: 3rd movement (Presto)
Alan Loveday, violin, and Stephen Shingles, viola, with the Academy of St Martin in the Fields conducted by Neville Marriner
DECCA 442 8239

Visit again in 2010 for more highlights from this concert.

Audio kindly supplied by Universal Music.

Currently available from iTunes: Sinfonia concertante