Thursday 27 February 2020 7.30–9.35pm Barbican

LSO SEASON CONCERT DAPHNIS AND CHLOE

James Albany Hoyle Thymiaterion (world premiere)* ELIM CHAN Rachmaninoff Concerto No 3 Interval Elizabeth Ogonek All These Lighted Things – three little dances for orchestra (European premiere) Ravel Daphnis and Chloe – Suite No 2

Elim Chan conductor Lukáš Vondráček piano

* Commissioned through the Panufnik Composers Scheme, generously supported by Lady Hamlyn and The Helen Hamlyn Trust Welcome Latest News On Our Blog

their generous support of the scheme, DONTALLA FLICK LSO ON SPRING’S STRAD CONCERTS which has supported some 90 composers CONDUCTING COMPETITION AND THE ‘EX KREISLER’ DEL GESÙ since its launch in 2005. Applications remain open for the 16th We turn our attention to some of the violins Alongside these contemporary works, Donatella Flick LSO Conducting Competition, (and violinists) that will be gracing the the Orchestra performs Rachmaninoff’s which takes place from 27 February to Barbican stage with the LSO in Spring. Piano Concerto No 3, for which we are 1 March 2021 in London. The biennial delighted to welcome soloist Lukáš competition, founded in 1990 by Donatella AND THE AWARD GOES TO … Vondráček, making his LSO debut Flick, marks its 30th anniversary this year. tonight. Suite No 2 from Ravel’s Daphnis The deadline for submissions is 6pm BST We turn back the clock and delve into the and Chloe concludes the programme. on Friday 26 June 2020. archives, finding stories and anecdotes from warm welcome to this LSO concert some of the greatest LSO recordings to receive at the Barbican, conducted by Elim I hope that you enjoy tonight’s concert and • lso.co.uk/more/news Oscar nominations for Best Original Score Chan. Since winning the Donatella that you are able to join us again soon. over the years – from Star Wars to Harry Flick LSO Conducting Competition in 2014, At the beginning of March, conductor and Potter and the 1994 version of Little Women. and becoming LSO Assistant Conductor, composer André J Thomas shares his skills Elim Chan has gone on to forge a successful and experience with the Orchestra in a WELCOME TO TONIGHT’S GROUPS • lso.co.uk/more/blog career across the US and Europe. It is a concert of gospel music, bringing together pleasure to welcome her tonight. hundreds of singers from across London. Linda Diggins & Friends Also in March, Karina Canellakis and Jasmine Buo & Friends The concert begins with a new work by Susanna Mälkki conduct works by Ravel, composer James Albany Hoyle, Thymiaterion, Strauss and Debussy. Groups of ten or more receive exclusive commissioned as part of the LSO Panufnik discounts to LSO concerts, with 20% off all Composers Scheme. Tonight also features ticket prices, or 30% off when booking two the European premiere of a recent piece or more concerts within the season at the by Elizabeth Ogonek, herself previously an same time. Extra benefits are available to LSO Panufnik Composer, who is now having Kathryn McDowell CBE DL larger groups. significant success in the US, including a Managing Director Please ensure all phones are switched off. relationship with the Music Academy of the Find out more at Photography and audio/video recording West, where the LSO is Resident Orchestra. • lso.co.uk/groups are not permitted during the performance. We extend our sincere thanks to Lady Hamlyn and The Helen Hamlyn Trust for

2 Welcome 27 February 2020 Programme Writers Coming Up

Jo Kirkbride is Chief Executive at the Dunedin Friday 28 February 1–2pm Friday 6 March 12.30–1.15pm Sunday 8 March 7pm Consort and a freelance writer on classical LSO St Luke’s LSO St Luke’s Barbican music. Her broad roster of clients includes the London Sinfonietta, , BBC RADIO 3 LUNCHTIME CONCERT LSO DISCOVERY: FREE FRIDAY LUNCHTIME CONCERT RAVEL & STRAUSS Aldeburgh Productions, Cheltenham Festival RUSSIAN ROOTS FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra. Strauss Die Frau ohne Schatten – Suite Kabalevsky Improvisation Shostakovich Five Pieces for two violins Ravel Piano Concerto in G major Andrew Huth is a musician, writer and Mussorgsky Une larme and piano Strauss Death and Transfiguration translator who writes extensively on French, Tchaikovsky Aveu passionné Prokofiev Sonata for two violins Ravel Russian and Eastern European music. Mussorgsky Hopak Sarasate Navarra Beethoven arr Bowden Adagio sostenuto Karina Canellakis conductor Andrew Stewart is a freelance music journalist from Piano Sonata No 14, ‘Moonlight’ for Naoko Keatley violin Cédric Tiberghien piano and writer. He is the author of The LSO at 90, and piano Alix Lagasse violin and contributes to a wide variety of specialist Shostakovich Viola Sonata Clare Isdell piano Thursday 12 March 7.30pm classical music publications. Rachel Leach presenter Barbican Lawrence Power viola Jeremy Thurlow is a composer; his music Pavel Kolesnikov piano Saturday 7 March 2.30pm LA MER ranges from string quartets to video-opera, Barbican and he won the George Butterworth Award Recorded for future broadcast by BBC Radio 3 Dvořák Violin Concerto in 2007. Author of a book on Henri Dutilleux, LSO DISCOVERY: FAMILY CONCERT Kaija Saariaho Laterna Magica he broadcasts on BBC Radio 3 and is a Fellow Sunday 1 March 7pm HOW TO BUILD AN ORCHESTRA Debussy La mer of Robinson College, Cambridge. Barbican When it comes to making music, there’s Susanna Mälkki conductor SYMPHONIC GOSPEL SPIRIT nothing like an orchestra! Learn how the Gil Shaham violin instruments come together to make onstage The moving power of gospel music meets the magic. Based on a new children’s book. 6pm Barbican dynamism of the LSO in a concert featuring LSO Platforms: Guildhall Artists choirs and singers from across London. Jessica Cottis conductor Free pre-concert recital Rachel Leach presenter André J Thomas conductor NaGuanda Nobles soprano 12–2.15pm Barbican Foyers Jason Dungee tenor Free Family Workshops

Coming Up 3 James Albany Hoyle Thymiaterion 2020 (world premiere) / note by Jo Kirkbride

ames Albany Hoyle’s LSO Panufnik colour the sound in different ways, such as single homogenous texture. But along the • JAMES ALBANY HOYLE commission is a companion piece to harmonic trills that add a mist of overtones way, there are moments of joyful cacophony IN CONVERSATION his work Marangona (written during and a sense of internal activity within the too, including a wild and colourful passage his time on the 2017 Panufnik Scheme), and sound itself.’ just before the final bell strike, which mimics ‘The great challenge and opportunity for can be performed alongside or without its a type of Japanese slot-machine arcade any composer today is that, aesthetically predecessor. Both share thematic material, It is a multi-dimensional approach and one known as a ‘Pachinko’. Here, Hoyle plays speaking, everything is possible. There are and both share a preoccupation with bells. that mirrors Hoyle’s preoccupation with once more upon the idea of ‘found sounds’, no rules or expectations to conform to any ‘I find bells interesting’, Hoyle explains, the various possible effects of bells. ‘In the Pachinko — like bells — creating an particular style, so there is an incredible ‘because the sounds produced by individual their most extreme dichotomic form’, says unintended sonic effect that is almost more artistic freedom. For an audience member bells when they resonate are often full of Hoyle, ‘these effects are represented on the compelling than its original purpose. • I think that’s extremely exciting – you character, history and cultural overtones, as one hand by music that is immobile and never know quite what to expect from a well as the complex sonic overtones.’ ritualistic, and on the other hand by music completely new piece! that is dynamic and flowing. The manner In Marangona, Hoyle replayed — in slow of their combination, and the way they I also enjoy seeing how different parts of a motion — the striking of an iconic Venetian dialogue and transition between each other, concert programme can communicate with bell. But in Thymiaterion, the reference forms the dialectic of the piece.’ So, Hoyle each other, how well-known pieces from is more indirect, the title an allusion to carves the orchestra into layers — often the repertoire can give context to a piece an ancient Greek incense burner whose with the wind and strings moving totally whose ink is still wet, and how a new piece swirling plumes of scented smoke, drifting independently — to mimic these swirling, can offer an audience a fresh perspective in different directions at different speeds, independent forms. But along this sinuous on music which may be many decades or Hoyle associates with the invisible, swirling musical journey, it is the points of contact, centuries old. sonic colours of a resonating bell. It is these the moments of overlap, that create the overtones — visible or invisible — rather than most compelling musical statements. I have always adored Ravel’s music and it the thing itself, to which Hoyle is inexorably has had a strong influence on my own work. drawn. He extends these exploratory In Hoyle’s score, these moments are When I joined the LSO Panufnik Scheme in processes to the instrumentation too, defined by three magnified bell strikes, 2017, I had one of my first ideas for the way I looking beyond traditional orchestration which increase in size upon each iteration would approach composing for the orchestra to find new layers within the orchestral and always end with the same recurring whilst watching the LSO rehearse Daphnis sound. ‘As the piece explores the more material (solo strings accompanied by soft and Chloe.’ sensorial qualities of sound and timbre’, bell chords). Each of these punctuation Hoyle explains, ‘I ask the strings to use points allows for the otherwise flickering Interview by Lydia Heald a number of playing techniques which orchestral patchwork to coalesce into a • lso.co.uk/more/blog

4 Programme Notes 27 February 2020 James Albany Hoyle In Profile b 1993 / profile by Jo Kirkbride

ames Albany Hoyle recalls starting For Hoyle, it is part of a process of exploration formidable impression on me’, he explains, to compose ‘almost instantly’ after and revelation, of looking beyond the surface ‘and to this day remains fundamental to taking up the violin, having quickly of a thing to its intricacies and overtones my compositional thinking.’ Indeed, it is discovered that his own ideas differed — a common theme in much of his music. also integral to his new LSO commission, dramatically from traditional pedagogical In Eikon (2017), he explored the tension Thymiaterion, a work which has brought his models. By 14, he was composing prolifically in Barbara Hepworth’s otherwise static, ideas and influences full circle in the most but, he says, ‘I still had no idea that there inanimate sculptures, which simultaneously pleasing of ways. was such a thing as composition lessons’. seem to exhibit a sense of movement and Now three years into a PhD in composition flow. Then, in his first Panufnik orchestral ‘I feel extraordinarily fortunate to have at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, work, Marangona (2018) — whose title received my first professional orchestral what started out as ‘something I did refers to one of the five bells atop St Mark’s commission from the LSO’, he says. alongside my violin playing’ has earned Basilica in Venice — he searched beyond the ‘It is an orchestra with which him commissions from ensembles such as physicality of the bell itself to ‘the sensory, anything is possible.’ • the Britten Sinfonia, EXAUDI and the colouristic, and even ritualistic aspects of Plus-Minus Ensemble, at venues including bell ringing’. Milton Court and Wigmore Hall. This preoccupation with simultaneous states There is a markedly structural, of being stems in part from a fascination three-dimensional quality to Hoyle’s with the music of Sibelius. ‘I am particularly music. Its fine layers, fragments and interested in the way his music is so often intricate repetitions seem to bind together in a state of flux and transition’, says Hoyle, into something physical, its angles and ‘and how despite the many states which it curvatures only gradually revealing traverses there is often such an elemental themselves as we navigate its boundaries. sense of oneness to his music.’ His fascination This is subtle, incremental music that is deep-seated: Hoyle recalls with fondness invites attentive listening. These are works playing Sibelius’ Fifth Symphony with a that reject immediacy in favour of a richer, youth orchestra at the Barbican, organised more rewarding layer beyond. by none other than the LSO. ‘It made a

Composer Profile 5 Sergei Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No 3 in D minor Op 30 1909 / note by Andrew Huth

1 Allegro ma non tanto in politics, and his reaction was to 20-year-old found the work concerto’s opening melody, unfolded by 2 Intermezzo: Adagio – poco più mosso leave Russia. In the autumn of 1906, he ‘dry, difficult and unappealing’, although he the soloist in simple octaves over a pulsing 3 Finale: Alla breve cancelled all his engagements and went thought Rachmaninoff’s first two concertos accompaniment, was derived from neither with his family to Germany. In Dresden, he ‘wonderfully charming’. of these sources but simply ’wrote itself’. Lukáš Vondráček piano composed, among other works, his Second The way in which it develops is typical of his Symphony. The success of this work in 1908 Rachmaninoff performed the Third Piano approach to composition: he begins with an achmaninov’s Third Piano Concerto did much to banish the ghosts of the First Concerto a total of 86 times over the immediately appealing tune, elaborates it, has long been famous as one of Symphony’s failure a decade earlier, and next three decades (as opposed to 143 then travels further and further afield with the most technically challenging between the death of Rimsky-Korsakov in performances of the Second), but it only contrasting material, but again and again of all Romantic concertos. Its length, at 1908 and the emergence a few years later achieved real popularity when it was taken returns to some form of the opening idea. around 45 minutes, makes it a formidable of Stravinsky and Prokofiev, Rachmaninoff, up by Vladimir Horowitz in the 1930s. The impression is that for all the concerto’s challenge to both players and listeners, and together with his contemporary Scriabin, Horowitz’s earlier recordings, as well as the variety, it springs from one single idea, one it demands enormous reserves of power and was recognised as one of the most composer’s own 1939 recording, are sadly particular and perhaps obsessive emotional endurance from the soloist. It also requires important figures in Russian music. marred by unnecessary cuts, particularly experience that can be viewed from different that particular approach so essential to all of in the finale, and until the 1960s it was angles but which underlies every aspect of Rachmaninoff’s longer works: just the right He completed the new concerto on standard practice among pianists to observe the music. mixture of precision and passion, of rigour 23 September 1909 and played it on 28 and these. Only Rachmaninoff’s chronic lack of and flexibility to shape the long melodic 30 November with the New York Symphony self-confidence (and perhaps his distrust The intermezzo provides an expected lines and illuminate the richly woven textures. Orchestra under Walter Damrosch, and then of his audiences’ attention spans) could and necessary contrast of key, tempo and again in January 1910 with Gustav Mahler have allowed him to sanction them, for they texture, but towards the end there is a faster The idea of a new piano concerto dates conducting the New York Philharmonic. After are as damaging to the work’s proportions episode, a sort of shadowy waltz, which from 1906, when Rachmaninoff first began the first Russian performance in Moscow as those he also made in the Second refers back directly to the first movement’s negotiations for an American tour; clearly, that April, the critic Grigori Prokofiev (no Symphony. No one today would dream of opening melody. This unity of experience is a big new work would be needed, but in the relation to the composer) wrote of the playing the concerto in abbreviated form. also reinforced by the way in which the slow event both the concerto and the tour had to concerto’s ‘sincerity, simplicity and clarity movement leads directly into the finale, as be postponed. These years were a high point of musical thought ... it has a sharp and Two important sources of melodic though the intermezzo’s melancholy song in Rachmaninoff’s triple career as composer, concise form as well as simple and brilliant inspiration for Rachmaninoff were the and the finale’s more extrovert gestures are conductor and pianist, but he still regarded orchestration, qualities that will secure contours of Russian folk music and the related aspects of the same experience. • composition as his main activity, and was both outer success and enduring love by chants of the Orthodox church, and these both frustrated and disturbed by the chaos musicians and public alike’ – an acute can be heard below the surface of much in Russia in the wake of the events of 1905. judgement, but one that took a long time to of the Third Concerto. Nevertheless, Interval – 20 minutes He was no revolutionary in either music or meet with general agreement. Indeed, the Rachmaninoff maintained that the

6 Programme Notes 27 February 2020 Sergei Rachmaninoff In Profile 1873–1943

in his son’s musical education. In 1882, the boy received a scholarship to study at the St Petersburg Conservatory, but further disasters at home hindered his progress and he moved to study at the Moscow Conservatory. Here he proved an outstanding piano pupil and began to study composition. COMING UP IN 2020

Rachmaninoff’s early works reveal his debt to the music of Rimsky-Korsakov and Tchaikovsky, although he rapidly forged a personal, richly lyrical musical language, FANTASIA ON A THEME BY THOMAS TALLIS clearly expressed in his Prelude in C-sharp & Vaughan Williams Symphony No 6 minor for piano of 1892. His First Symphony with Sir Antonio Pappano of 1897 was savaged by the critics, which 15 March caused the composer’s confidence to evaporate. In desperation, he sought help MAHLER SYMPHONY NO 4 from Dr Nikolai Dahl, whose hypnotherapy & Ligeti Violin Concerto with Sir Simon Rattle sessions restored Rachmaninoff’s self- & Patricia Kopatchinskaja ‘ elody is music,’ wrote belief and gave him the will to complete 26 April Rachmaninoff, ‘the basis of his Second Piano Concerto, widely known music as a whole, since a perfect through its later use as the soundtrack for DVOŘÁK ‘FROM THE NEW WORLD’ melody implies and calls into being its own the classic filmBrief Encounter. Thereafter, & Mozart Violin Concerto No 2 harmonic design’. The Russian composer, his creative imagination ran free to produce with Ádám Fischer & Nikolaj Szeps-Znaider pianist and conductor’s passion for melody a string of unashamedly romantic works 21 May was central to his work, clearly heard in his divorced from newer musical trends. He left Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, a brilliant Russia shortly before the October Revolution GERSHWIN PIANO CONCERTO IN F MAJOR and diverse set of variations on a tune by the in 1917, touring as a pianist and conductor & An American in great 19th-century violinist and composer and buying properties in Europe and the with Kirill Gerstein & Sir Simon Rattle Niccolò Paganini. Although the young United States.• 6 June Sergei’s father squandered much of the family inheritance, he at first invested wisely Profile by Andrew Stewart lso.co.uk/201920

Composer Profile 7 Elizabeth Ogonek All These Lighted Things – three little dances for orchestra 2017 (European premiere)

1 Exuberant, playful, bright All These Lighted Things takes its title from reveals itself as a dance very sparsely, • ON LSO LIVE 2 Gently drifting, hazy a poem by Thomas Merton, a 20th-century only in certain moments’. These elusive 3 Buoyant French-born American poet and Trappist moments emerge from amidst a wash of monk. The poem is a meditation on the wide divided strings, piercing the warm, lizabeth Ogonek is proof that the dawn, and on the sense of relief that it golden haze with brief shafts of light. But LSO Panufnik Scheme develops brings as darkness is cast away once more. if the preceding movements are made up composers of the highest calibre. Ogonek carves her score into ‘three little of disparate threads, the finale binds these Having joined the Scheme in 2013, she went dances’, character pieces that are linked together. ‘The third movement is about the on to win the RPS Composition Prize the together by what she calls ‘an overwhelming orchestra as a community’, Ogonek explains. following year, and in 2015 became one of sense of happiness and joy’. The idea of Individually, each instrument has its own the youngest composers in history to be light, so central to the poem, is integral part to play, each has its own motif — and appointed as Composer-in-Residence at to the score too, which oscillates between indeed some of these are mirrored across the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, for whom moments of bright, white brilliance and other instruments. But there is a moment she composed All These Lighted Things. soft, glowing calm. ‘All These Lighted Things towards the middle of the movement This remarkable career has been shaped is really about brightness, beams of light when at last they coalesce into a single by her passion for language, fostering happening’, says Ogonek, a motif that is homogeneous texture, seeing the work collaborations with poets and playwrights, highlighted by the sharp sound of Burma out in a sustained blaze of light. • The Panufnik Legacies II and even taking her work into correctional bells, ‘impure and imperfect’. facilities in America, where she has worked Note by Jo Kirkbride François-Xavier Roth conductor with inmates to transform their poetry into ‘The first dance is really ecstatic and music. ‘It was a developmental thing for very bright’, Ogonek explains, ‘it has a lot Showcasing the works of selected me’, she says of her fondness for working of metallic sounds’. Marked ‘exuberant, composers from across the first ten years with texts. ‘It helped me hone in on the playful, bright’, it crackles with energy and of the LSO Panufnik Scheme alongside things that were important to my craft as flickers with life, with high-pitched strings Panufnik Variations, a project that brings a composer, to refine my technical abilities. and jittery winds lending a nervousness together Colin Matthews and Panufnik It was a way of imposing creative constraints that threatens to spill over into disorder. Scheme graduates. on myself so I could really measure what By contrast, the central movement is a I was doing.’ slow dance which, says Ogonek, ‘only Available to purchase at lsolive.co.uk, on iTunes and Amazon, or to stream on Spotify and Apple Music.

8 Programme Notes 27 February 2020 Elizabeth Ogonek In Profile

lizabeth Ogonek, whose music birds and Sleep & Unremembrance. Both premiere under Sakari Oramo at the opening has been described as ‘shimmering’, pieces were premiered under the direction night of the 2020 BBC Proms. ‘dramatic’ and ‘painstakingly crafted’ of François-Xavier Roth at the Barbican by the Chicago Tribune, is an American Centre. During the 2019/20 season, the LSO In the summer of 2018, Ogonek was in composer living and working in the Midwest. gives the European premiere of All These residence at the Music Academy of the West Lighted Things, while the Toronto Symphony in Santa Barbara, California. Her music was In 2015, Ogonek was appointed to the Orchestra will give the Canadian premiere also featured in the 2018 BBC Proms in a Chicago Symphony Orchestra as one of its of as though birds. Other orchestras that collaboration with Gerard McBurney. In early Mead Composers-in-Residence, a position have performed her music include the Royal 2020, Ogonek was in residence with the which she held alongside Samuel Adams Philharmonic Orchestra, the Civic Orchestra FLUX Quartet at Kanagawa Kenmin Hall in until 2018. During her tenure with the CSO, of Chicago, the American Composers’ Yokohama, Japan for performances of her she was commissioned to write three new Orchestra and the Music Academy of the Running at Still Life. works: In Silence (after Biber), a chamber West’s Academy Festival Orchestra. violin concerto featuring violinist Benjamin Ogonek’s work has been recognised by the Beilman, which was premiered under the Recent notable chamber and solo projects ASCAP Foundation, the Royal Philharmonic direction of Elim Chan; an orchestral work include two works for the Santa Fe Chamber Society, the Ohio Arts Council and the entitled All These Lighted Things, conducted Music Festival, a work for Ensemble 360, American Academy of Arts and Letters. by Riccardo Muti and later featured on the a solo piano work commissioned by the orchestra’s 2017 West Coast tour; and The Music Academy of the West and a Fromm Ogonek was born in 1989 in Anoka, Water Cantos, a work for twelve players Foundation commissioned work, where are Minnesota and was raised in New York City. commissioned in celebration of the 20th we now, for pianist Xak Bjerken, percussion Her teachers included Don Freund, Claude anniversary season of MusicNOW, premiered quartet and male vocal sextet on a text by Baker, Michael Gandolfi, Donald Crockett, under Esa-Pekka Salonen. She was also Paul Griffiths. Stephen Hartke and Julian Anderson. responsible for co-curating MusicNOW, the A former Beinecke and Marshall Scholar, she orchestra’s new music series, which brought Forthcoming projects for the 2019/20 holds degrees from the Indiana University together CSO musicians with composers season include a new chamber work for the Jacobs School of Music (BM 2009), the to explore the music of today as well as 75th anniversary season of the Chamber University of Southern California Thornton influential works of the 20th century. Music Conference and Composers’ Forum School of Music (MM 2012) and the Guildhall of the East, and a new orchestral work that School of Music and Drama (DMus 2017). Ogonek has also worked closely with the has been co-commissioned for the BBC Currently, she is an Assistant Professor of London Symphony Orchestra, for whom she Symphony Orchestra and the Los Angeles Composition at Oberlin Conservatory. • has written two orchestral works: as though Philharmonic, which will receive its world

Composer Profile 9 Daphnis and Chloe – Suite No 2 1909–12 / note by Jeremy Thurlow

1 Lever du jour (Daybreak) with reproducing faithfully the Greece of In the first, dawn steals over the cave • SERGEI DIAGHILEV 2 Pantomime my dreams, very like that imagined by where Daphnis wakes, and he is reunited 3 Danse générale French artists at the turn of the 18th with Chloe; this glorious sequence is one Russian-born Sergei Diaghilev was an art century’. It did not prove easy to reconcile of Ravel’s most sumptuous inspirations, critic, patron, ballet impresario and founder ance holds a treasured and this with Fokine’s vision of the ‘archaic both exquisite and powerful as it evokes of the famous Ballets Russes, widely regarded central place in Ravel’s music, dancing painted in red and black on Attic the babbling stream, the rising sun and the as the most influential ballet company of from La valse and to the vases’, and when arguments also broke out lovers’ rapturous emotions. In the second the 20th century. Based in Paris and active many pavanes, minuets, waltzes, foxtrots between Fokine and Nijinsky, Diaghilev came tableau – the term ‘Pantomime’ has no from 1909 to 1929, the Ballets Russes and tangos that pervade his instrumental close to calling the whole thing off. The last slapstick connotations here – they show reinvigorated the art of performative dance, and operatic music. The hour-long ballet straw was Ravel’s long drawn-out difficulty their gratitude to the gods by enacting Pan’s and many of its dancers went on to found Daphnis and Chloe makes a strong claim completing the riotous 'Danse générale', seduction of Syrinx, to a long and infinitely ballet traditions in the US and the UK. to be his greatest work; Ravel called it a which in the end took him almost a year. seductive flute solo which is another high ‘choreographic symphony’, indicating his Initially scheduled for the 1910 season, point of the work. Finally, forgetting their pride at the way its kaleidoscopic moods, Daphnis and Chloe was twice postponed roles, the lovers fall into each other’s arms; colours and dance-rhythms are integrated and finally presented in May 1912. everyone joins them in the final dance, into a compelling musical and dramatic arc. — The great impresario Sergei Diaghilev • Daphnis and Chloe makes a strong claim to be his greatest work … commissioned the new piece for his Ballets Russes in 1909, bringing together its kaleidoscopic moods, colours and dance-rhythms are integrated an impressive creative team: Nijinsky and into a compelling musical and dramatic arc. Karsavina dancing the title roles; Mikhail — Fokine as choreographer; Léon Bakst as designer; and Pierre Monteux to conduct The scenario is taken from an erotic pastoral a wild and wine-fuelled affair of sheer pagan Ravel’s new score. Things did not go by the second-century Greek writer Longus. joy and exhilaration. Ultimately Daphnis and smoothly, however, particularly between Daphnis and Chloe are childhood sweethearts Chloe is, more than a tale of two lovers, the Ravel and Fokine. Each spoke almost nothing in the idyllic hills of Lesbos; Chloe is abducted celebration of an idyllic fantasy-world; his of the other’s language, and their artistic by pirates, then rescued by Pan and restored Classical Neverland inspired Ravel to the visions differed too. As he said, Ravel aimed to safety. The second suite follows the course richest and fullest expression of his art. • ‘to compose a vast musical fresco in which of the ballet’s final tableau, and falls into I was less concerned with archaism than three broad sequences.

10 Programme Notes 27 February 2020 Maurice Ravel In Profile 1875–1937

backward-looking judges of the Prix de Rome for not satisfying the demands of academic counterpoint. In the early 20th RAVEL century, he completed many outstanding works, including the evocative Miroirs for DEBUSSY piano, and his first opera,L’heure espagnole. DUKAS In 1909, Ravel was invited to write a large- scale work for Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes, completing the score to Daphnis and Chloe three years later. At this time, he also met Stravinsky and first heard the expressionist works of Schoenberg. During the First World Sunday 8 March 7pm Sunday 22 March 10am–5pm lthough born in the rural Basque War, he enlisted with the motor transport Barbican Barbican & LSO St Luke’s village of Ciboure, Ravel was raised corps, and returned to compos­it­ion slowly in Paris. First-rate piano lessons after 1918, completing La valse for Diaghilev RAVEL PIANO CONCERTO DISCOVERY DAY: DUKAS and instruction in harmony and counterpoint and beginning work on his second opera, & LA VALSE ensured that, in 1889, the boy was accepted L’enfant et les sortilèges. From 1932 until Attend an LSO morning rehearsal with as a preparatory piano student at the Paris his death, he suffered from the progressive Karina Canellakis conductor François-Xavier Roth (pictured above) Conservatoire. As a full-time student, Ravel effects of Pick’s disease and was unable to Cédric Tiberghien piano followed by a talk and chamber music explored a wide variety of new music and compose. His emotional expression is most in the afternoon. forged a close friendship with the Spanish powerful in his imaginative interpretations Thursday 12 March 7.30pm pianist Ricardo Viñes. Both were introduced of the unaffected worlds of childhood and Barbican Sunday 22 March 7pm in 1893 to Chabrier, who Ravel regarded as animals, and in exotic tales such as the Barbican ‘the most profoundly personal, the most Greek lovers Daphnis and Chloe. Spain also DEBUSSY LA MER French of our composers’. Ravel also met influenced Ravel’s creative personality, DUKAS and was influenced by Erik Satie around this his mother’s Basque inheritance strongly Susanna Mälkki conductor time. In the decade following his graduation reflected in a wide variety of works, together Gil Shaham violin Dukas The Sorcerer’s Apprentice in 1895, Ravel scored a notable hit with the with his liking for the formal elegance of Dukas Polyeucte Pavane pour une infante défunte for piano 18th-century French art and music. • Dukas Symphony in C (later orchestrated). Even so, his works lso.co.uk/201920 were rejected several times by the Profile by Andrew Stewart François-Xavier Roth conductor

Composer Profile 11 DANCING ON THE EDGE OF A 2020/21 SEASON SIR SIMON RATTLE Berg, Hindemith, Bartók, Stravinsky & Weill

LSO ARTIST PORTRAIT VOLCANO Christian Tetzlaff When the world changed forever, what happened to music? FRANÇOIS-XAVIER ROTH Varèse & Berlioz

GIANANDREA NOSEDA Shostakovich, Prokofiev & Tchaikovsky Public booking opens 10am on Monday 16 March lso.co.uk/2021 Elim Chan In Conversation / interview by Lydia Heald

In December 2014, Elim Chan became the first female winner of the Donatella Flick LSO Conducting Competition and with it, became Assistant Conductor of the Orchestra for one year. We caught up with the young conductor to find out more about where her career has taken her since then and what a conductor’s life is like.

You won the Donatella Flick LSO Conducting Night this season. The memory of that Competition in December 2014. How does it special evening is something I will cherish feel looking back on that five years later? for a long time.

It’s unbelievable that it’s already been five How does it feel to come back to conduct years since that magical moment in my life, the LSO each year? and I still hold such fond memories of that evening when I conducted the LSO for the I feel incredibly lucky to have had the support first time in my life in the final round of the of the LSO since the beginning. Every project competition. I can only continue to count my I do has its own challenges and it’s been a blessings since I got to know the wonderful lot of fun and joy tackling them together with LSO family, who have been so supportive. the Orchestra. With each experience, we get to know each other better – now it feels a What have been some of the most exciting bit like meeting up with a good friend, and I am excited to hear how all the pieces But in a way, I do think contemporary developments for you so far in your career? that’s a wonderful feeling to have! communicate and shed new light on one music offers a much more lively process in another in this context. rehearsals because the musicians and I can I recently completed my first ever tour with How did you put together this programme actually bring our questions and thoughts the Antwerp Symphony Orchestra – where that mixes contemporary with household Is there a difference in the way you approach to the composer directly – we can all actively I am Chief Conductor as of this season – in classical names? music by living composers compared to the explore the possibilities together. The the Baltics and Russia, and I am still trying likes of Ravel and Rachmaninoff? rehearsal process becomes much more alive, to process this very meaningful experience The title of Elizabeth Ogonek’s piece comes stimulating and meaningful! • with my team, my partners-in-crime. I also from a poem that meditates on dawn, and Not at all – music by living composers had the very exciting opportunity of stepping I could not help but think about Ravel’s deserves the same amount of work and in for Franz Welser-Möst to conduct the most magical way of depicting sunrise diligent preparation from us as the classics Read the full interview online Concertgebouw Orchestra in their Opening in Suite No 2 of Daphnis and Chloe. by giants of the past. • lso.co.uk/more/blog

In Conversation 13 Elim Chan conductor

ne of the most sought-after Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra, London Elim Chan holds degrees from Smith College young conductors and already Symphony Orchestra and the Australian and the University of Michigan. Whilst widely admired for her unique Youth Orchestra, amongst many others. there, she served as Music Director of the combination of ‘drama and tenderness, University of Michigan Campus Symphony power and delicacy’ (Hereford Times), Elim Celebrated by the press for her debuts with Orchestra and the Michigan Pops Orchestra. Chan became the first female winner of the the Philadelphia Orchestra and Deutsches She also received the Bruno Walter Donatella Flick LSO Conducting Competition Symphonie-Orchester Berlin in 2019, other Conducting Scholarship in 2013. • in 2014 and has now been appointed Chief highlights last season included engagements Conductor of the Antwerp Symphony with the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Orchestra from this season. In addition, she Bremen at Hamburg’s Elbphilharmonie, has also held the position of Principal Guest Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, and Sydney Conductor of the Royal Scottish National Symphony Orchestras alongside returns to Orchestra since 2018/19. Los Angeles Philharmonic and Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestras. Highlights of the 2019/20 season include an appearance at the BBC Proms, where Elim Chan became Assistant Conductor Elim Chan conducts the BBC National of the London Symphony Orchestra in Orchestra of Wales, followed by her debuts 2015/16 and was appointed to the Dudamel with the Ensemble Intercontemporain, Fellowship programme with the Los Angeles Konzerthausorchester Berlin, Gürzenich- Philharmonic in 2016/17. Previously, she led Orchester Köln, Gothenburg Symphony the Orchestre de la Francophonie as part of and Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestras, the NAC Summer Music Institute in 2012 Swedish Radio and Toronto Symphony where she worked with Pinchas Zukerman, Orchestras and the National Youth and participated in the Musical Olympus Orchestra of Great Britain. She returns to Festival in St Petersburg, as well as in the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra for their workshops with the Cabrillo Festival and season opening concerts at Amsterdam Baltimore Symphony Orchestras (with Marin Concertgebouw and Dortmund Konzerthaus, Alsop, Gerard Schwarz and Gustav Meier). as well as to the Philharmonia Orchestra, She also took part in masterclasses with in Lucerne in spring 2015.

14 Artist Biographies 27 February 2020 Lukáš Vondráček piano

ollowing recent debuts with At the age of four, Lukáš Vondráček made After finishing his studies at the Academy of the Pittsburgh and Tokyo his first public appearance. As a 15-year-old Music in Katowice and Vienna Conservatoire, Metropolitan Symphony Orchestras, in 2002, he made his debut with the Czech Lukáš Vondráček obtained an Artist Diploma hr-Sinfonieorchester and the Royal Scottish Philharmonic Orchestra and Vladimir from Boston’s New England Conservatory National Orchestra, Lukáš Vondráček has a Ashkenazy, which was followed by a major under the tutelage of Hung-Kuan Chen, season packed with highlights ahead of him. US tour in 2003. His natural and assured graduating with honours in 2012. • In 2019/20, the winner of the International musicality and remarkable technique have Queen Elisabeth Piano Competition long marked him out as a gifted and mature 2016 makes his debuts with the London musician. He has achieved worldwide Symphony, Chicago Symphony and Los recognition by receiving many international Angeles Philharmonic Orchestras, and awards, including first prizes at the Hilton has been reinvited to perform with the Head and San Marino International Piano Colorado Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre Competitions and Unisa International Piano Philharmonique Royal de Liège and the Competition in Pretoria, South Africa, as well Belgian National Orchestra, among others. as the Raymond E Buck Jury Discretionary Award at the 2009 Van Cliburn International Over the last decade, Lukáš Vondráček has Piano Competition. travelled the world working with orchestras such as the Philadelphia and Sydney Lukáš Vondráček has worked with conductors Symphony Orchestras, Orquestra Sinfônica including Paavo Järvi, Gianandrea Noseda, do Estado de São Paulo, Philharmonia, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Christopher Warren- Oslo Philharmonic and Netherlands Green, Marin Alsop, Christoph Eschenbach, Philharmonic Orchestras. Recitals have Pietari Inkinen, Vasily Petrenko, Jakub Hrůša, taken him to Hamburg’s Elbphilharmonie, Anu Tali, Xian Zhang, Krzysztof Urbański, Deutschlandfunk Köln, the Flagey in Stéphane Denève and Elim Chan. Brussels, Leipzig’s Gewandhaus, Wiener Konzerthaus, the Concertgebouw and to festivals such as the Menuhin Festival Gstaad and PianoEspoo in Finland.

Artist Biographies 15 London Symphony Orchestra on stage tonight

Leader Second Violins Cellos Flutes Horns Timpani LSO String Experience Scheme Carmine Lauri David Alberman Charles-Antoine Gareth Davies Timothy Jones Nigel Thomas Since 1992, the LSO String Experience Thomas Norris Archambault Sarah Bennett Angela Barnes Peter Fleckenstein Scheme has enabled young string players First Violins Sarah Quinn Alastair Blayden Patricia Moynihan Alexander Edmundson from the London music conservatoires at Clare Duckworth Miya Väisänen Jennifer Brown Flora Bain Percussion the start of their professional careers to gain Laura Dixon David Ballesteros Noel Bradshaw Piccolo James Pillai Sam Walton work experience by playing in rehearsals William Melvin Matthew Gardner Hilary Jones Sharon Williams David Jackson and concerts with the LSO. The musicians Elizabeth Pigram Naoko Keatley Laure Le Dantec Paul Stoneman are treated as professional ‘extra’ players Claire Parfitt Alix Lagasse Amanda Truelove Oboes Philip Cobb Jeremy Cornes (additional to LSO members) and receive fees Laurent Quenelle Csilla Pogany Victoria Simonsen Olivier Stankiewicz Robin Totterdell Tom Edwards for their work in line with LSO section players. Harriet Rayfield Belinda McFarlane Peteris Sokolovskis Rosie Jenkins Niall Keatley Rachel Gledhill Colin Renwick Iwona Muszynska Deborah Tolksdorf Gerald Ruddock Oliver Yates The Scheme is supported by: Sylvain Vasseur Paul Robson Cor Anglais Helen Edordu The Polonsky Foundation Rhys Watkins Camille Joubert Double Basses Sarah Harper Peter Fleckenstein Derek Hill Foundation Alexandra Lomeiko Patrycja Mynarska Ivan Zavgorodniy Anthony Howe Barbara Whatmore Charitable Trust Julian Azkoul Colin Paris Clarinets James Maynard Harps Thistle Trust Eleanor Fagg Patrick Laurence Lorenzo Paini Lucy Wakeford Idlewild Trust Hilary Jane Parker Edward Vanderspar Matthew Gibson Chi-Yu Mo Bass Catherine Derrick Erzsebet Racz Gillianne Haddow Thomas Goodman Sarah Thurlow Paul Milner Performing tonight are: Malcolm Johnston José Moreira Piano Bridget O’Donnell; Evangeline Tang Anna Bastow Joseph Cowie Bass Clarinet Catherine Edwards German Clavijo Adam Wynter Duncan Gould Ben Thomson Taking part in rehearsals for tonight was: Julia O’Riordan Yong Jun Lee Carol Ella Bassoons Robert Turner Daniel Jemison Editorial Photography Fiona Dalgliesh Joost Bosdijk Ranald Mackechnie, Chris Wahlberg, Harald May Dolan Helen Simons Hoffmann, Marco Borggreve, Aleksandr Karjaka, Claire Maynard Hasselblad HSD, Rahi Rezvani Studio, Irene Kim Luba Tunnicliffe Contra Bassoon Print Cantate 020 3651 1690 Dominic Morgan Advertising Cabbells Ltd 020 3603 7937

Details were correct at time of going to press.

16 The Orchestra 27 February 2020