London Symphony Orchestra Living Music Tuesday 2 June 2015 7.30pm Barbican Hall LSO INTERNATIONAL VIOLIN FESTIVAL JANINE JANSEN Edward Rushton I nearly went, there (UK premiere) Mendelssohn Violin Concerto SundayINTERVAL 21 September 2014 7.30pm BarbicanMahler Symphony Hall No 5 London’s Symphony Orchestra MAKEDaniel HardingUP A TITLE conductor HERE Janine Jansen violin Composer Work ComposerConcert finishes Work approx 10pm Composer Work The LSO International Violin Festival is Namegenerously conductor supported by Jonathan Moulds CBE Name soloist Concert finishes approx ?.??pm International Violin Festival Media Partner 2 Welcome 2 June 2015 Welcome Living Music Kathryn McDowell In Brief Tonight we are delighted to welcome back the PANUFNIK COMPOSERS WORKSHOP 2015 LSO’s Principal Guest Conductor Daniel Harding, following a tour of Germany and Switzerland with Witness the fascinating process of putting together the Orchestra. This evening’s concert begins with and rehearsing a new orchestral piece as the LSO the UK premiere of a new work, I nearly went, there, works with six of the UK’s most promising emerging by British composer Edward Rushton, who first composers, under the guidance of Colin Matthews wrote for the LSO in 2008 when his piece Everything and conductor François-Xavier Roth. The workshops Goes So Fast, which Daniel Harding also conducted, take place on Friday 5 June at LSO St Luke’s. The was commissioned as part of the UBS Soundscapes: composers taking part are Michael Cryne, Michael Pioneers scheme. Cutting, Vitalija Glovackyte˙, Alex Roth, Jack Sheen and Michael Taplin. Tickets are free; to reserve your Our soloist is violin virtuoso Janine Jansen, a great place, phone the Box Office on 020 7638 8891. friend and regular collaborator of the LSO, who also joined us on tour in Europe. Tonight she performs Generously supported by the Helen Hamlyn Trust Mendelssohn’s much-loved Violin Concerto, a work that contrasts rich lyricism with bravura virtuosity. lso.co.uk/composers The programme concludes with Mahler’s Symphony No 5, a work of monumental proportions, both THE LSO AT THE BBC PROMS technically and expressively. The LSO returns to the BBC Proms this summer I hope you enjoy the concert and can join us with Principal Conductor Valery Gergiev for a concert again soon. On 7 June, Marin Alsop will conduct on 28 July showcasing all five of Prokofiev’s piano the Orchestra in a programme of works by three concertos. Joining the Orchestra on stage at the of the best known expatriate composers – Bartók, Royal Albert Hall will be soloists Daniil Trifonov, Korngold and Rachmaninov – joined by Canadian Sergei Babayan and Alexei Volodin. violinist James Ehnes. bbc.co.uk/proms A WARM WELCOME TO TONIGHT’S GROUPS Kathryn McDowell CBE DL The LSO offers great benefits for groups of 10+. Managing Director Tonight we are delighted to welcome: Ian Fyfe and Friends, Jane Cole and Friends and Helen Brunner and Friends lso.co.uk/groups lso.co.uk LSO International Violin Festival 3 Coming soon LSO International Violin Festival 1 MOVEMENT ONE 2 MOVEMENT TWO 3 MOVEMENT THREE A thinker of the violin as well as a supreme virtuosoNAME NAME INSTRUMENT of the instrument. The Daily TelegraphProgramme note body. on James Ehnes If note goes over a spread. PROGRAMME NOTE AUTHOR Last paragraph. LINDSAY KEMP is a senior producer for BBC Radio 3, including programming lunchtime concerts from LSO St Luke’s, Artistic Director of the Lufthansa Festival of Baroque Music, and a regular contributor to Gramophone magazine. JAMES EHNES ALINA IBRAGIMOVA JOSHUA BELL THE STRAD SUNDAY Sun 7 Jun 2015 7.30pm Sun 14 Jun 2015 7.30pm Sun 28 Jun 2015 7.30pm Sun 28 Jun 2015 Bartók Divertimento for Strings Mozart Violin Concerto No 3 Sibelius Violin Concerto Photographic Exhibition Korngold Violin Concerto Mahler Symphony No 1 (‘Titan’) Berlioz Symphonie fantastique 3–5.30pm, Fountain Room Rachmaninov Symphonic Dances Panel Discussion: Making Marin Alsop conductor Bernard Haitink conductor Pablo Heras-Casado conductor Instrument Lessons Fun for Kids James Ehnes violin Alina Ibragimova violin Joshua Bell violin 6pm, Barbican Hall LSO Platforms Free entry, no ticket required 6pm – Korngold Chamber Music performed by Guildhall School students 020 7638 8891 The LSO International Violin Festival is generously supported by Jonathan Moulds CBE International Violin Festival Media Partner lso.co.uk/violinfestival 4 Programme Notes 2 June 2015 Edward Rushton (b 1972) I nearly went, there (UK premiere) (2015) PROGRAMME NOTE BY Upon being commissioned to write a piece to Instead, my piece, now entitled I nearly went, there, EDWARD RUSHTON go with Mahler’s Fifth Symphony, my thoughts encircles thoughts of madness, a near-miss, a immediately sprung to the composer’s wife, Alma, condition of precariousness on the edge of chaos, and her reaction on hearing him play the new a narrow escape: someone who has been teetering piece through to her, as described in one of her on the brink is rescued, picked up and placed autobiographies. In a text written before composing on safe ground at the last minute before the my piece, which was originally entitled Being catastrophic fall. Nonetheless, the hard-won stability Mahler’s Fifth Symphony, I described my reaction at the end of my piece is unsettling, taking the ALMA MAHLER (1879–1964) to her reaction: form of a funeral march, based, like the one at the learned the piano and began opening of Mahler’s symphony, on the pitch C-sharp. composing as a child, later taking ‘… my wish is to rediscover the substantial composition lessons with Alexander percussion parts … that, according to Alma, he Mahler travels an immense journey between the Zemlinsky. In 1902 she married excised from the score after she had burst into tears opening and closing notes of his symphony, a mere Gustav Mahler, the first of three claiming that he had ‘scored it for snare drum alone’. semitone apart; I repeatedly wonder what might or marriages to influential artists. One Apparently this much-quoted anecdote is pure can happen between C-sharp and D, what chaos of the terms of her marriage was that fiction, one of Alma’s Mahler-myths. And yet, I can’t lies within that tantalising gap, into which it seems she would retire from composing. help wondering what the Adagietto would sound like so difficult to fall. In the end I decided on rescuing For years she was creatively stifled, with the cowbell parts restored. Starting from the everyone from the brink of theoretical contemplation eventually becoming severely opening fanfare, I imagine getting back inside the of what might have been, and of what might be depressed. Following a crisis in Real Fifth, a version that exists in a parallel universe possible, ending – at the last minute – in the lucky their marriage after his discovery where spouses do not interfere in their spouses’ salvation of A-flat major. The D breaks through to of her affair with architect Walter work, and where real composers aren’t stingy with E-flat, the C-sharp escapes towards C, thereby Gropius, Mahler began to take a the percussion.’ commencing another slippery slope … serious interest in her artistic life, championing several of her works Although an idea of a contemplation on the inner for voice and orchestra and preparing life of the ‘Real Fifth’ remains, it no longer centres the scores for publication. around the restoration of the percussion parts. In the end it was enough merely to imagine and not to compose this act of salvation; indeed, I seem to have acted as my own interfering spouse somewhere along the line, since there remains not much percussion at all, not even cowbells. lso.co.uk Composer Profile 5 Edward Rushton Composer Profile London Symphony Orchestra Edward Rushton grew up in Cambridge and Leeds and studied at Chetham’s School of Music, Manchester; King’s College, Cambridge; the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama; and the Zürich University of Applied Arts. His composition teachers have included Robin Holloway and James MacMillan. He has been living in Zürich since 1998, and in 2013 received that city’s annual stipend for composition. LUNCHTIME CONCERTS AT LSO ST LUKE’S LSO INTERNATIONAL VIOLIN FESTIVAL Recent concert works have been commissioned for and BBC RADIO 3 LSO DISCOVERY played by such groups as the Schubert Ensemble, Birmingham LUNCHTIME CONCERTS FREE LUNCHTIME CONCERTS Contemporary Music Group, Tonhalle Orchestra Zürich, Leeds Lieder, Orchestra of the National Theatre Mannheim, London Symphony Thu 11 Jun 2015 1pm Fri 12 Jun 2015 12.30pm Orchestra, Counterpoise, The Choir of Gonville and Caius College, Beethoven and Brahms Guildhall School Violinists Cambridge, Harry White Trio, Gemischter Chor Zürich, Origen Festival James Ehnes violin Rachel Leach presenter Steven Osborne piano and the University of Zürich. Fri 26 Jun 2015 12.30pm Thu 18 Jun 2015 1pm Maxine Kwok-Adams violin Rushton is widely acclaimed as a composer of operas and has worked Beethoven and Schumann Philip Nolte violin with The Opera Group, Ensemble für neue Musik Zürich, Zürich Opera Veronika Eberle violin Rachel Leach presenter and the Cheltenham Festival on numerous productions. Leinen aus Michail Lifits piano Smyrna, to a libretto by Dagny Gioulami, was joint-winner of the Fri 26 Jun will also be live- Teatro Minimo competition organised by Opernhaus Zürich and the Thu 25 Jun 2015 1pm streamed at youtube.com/lso Mozart and Beethoven Bavarian State Opera in 2001. Gioulami and Rushton’s opera for Nicola Benedetti violin LSO Discovery Free Lunchtime children, Im Schatten des Maulbeerbaums, was premiered by Zürich Alexei Grynyuk piano Concerts are supported by the Opera in 2008 and received a new production at the State Opera of Sold out; returns only Rothschild Charities Committee Hannover in 2013.