London Symphony Orchestra Living Music

Sunday 14 June 2015 7.30pm Barbican Hall

LSO INTERNATIONAL VIOLIN FESTIVAL

Mozart Violin Concerto No 3 SundayINTERVAL 21 September 2014 7.30pm BarbicanMahler Symphony Hall No 1 (‘Titan’)

London’s Symphony Orchestra MAKEBernard UP Haitink A TITLE conductor HERE Alina Ibragimova violin Composer Work ComposerConcert finishes Work approx 9.30pm 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 14 June 2015

Welcome Living Music Kathryn McDowell In Brief

A very warm welcome to the first of two concerts PICTURES IN MUSIC, 25 JUNE 2015 this month with conductor . It is always a pleasure for the LSO to work with Bernard, On 25 June, the LSO presents Pictures in Music, a who has a very special relationship with the concert that celebrates the joy of live music-making, Orchestra’s musicians, and we are delighted that inviting young musicians from across East London to he will return in September to open our 2015/16 share the Barbican stage with LSO musicians. They season with three concerts at the Barbican followed will perform Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition by a tour to Japan. Bernard Haitink is one of the with specially created illustrations projected onto world’s foremost interpreters of Mahler and he will the stage, Vaughan Williams’ The Lark Ascending close the concert this evening with the composer’s with LSO Leader , and a new piece First Symphony. written especially for the occasion by Howard Moody.

We also welcome this evening’s soloist, violinist lso.co.uk/pictures Alina Ibragimova, who opens the programme with Mozart’s Violin Concerto No 3. Sincere thanks must go to Jonathan Moulds for his generous support of THE SOUTH BANK SKY ARTS AWARDS the LSO International Violin Festival, and also to our media partner, The Strad, who have covered all the Sir Peter Maxwell Davies’ Symphony No 10, which events in the Festival in print and online. was commissioned and given its world premiere by the LSO, has won a prestigious South Bank Sky Arts I hope that you enjoy the concert and can join award in the Classical category. The performance us again on 21 June for Bernard Haitink’s second was recorded by LSO Live, and is available to concert with the LSO this month, and on 28 June as download from our website. we welcome back conductor Pablo Heras-Casado for the final instalment of the Violin Festival. lsolive.lso.co.uk

A WARM WELCOME TO TONIGHT’S GROUPS

The LSO offers great benefits for groups of 10+. Kathryn McDowell CBE DL Tonight we are delighted to welcome: Managing Director The Koncertclub National Junior College The One Style Tour, Taiwan Teruko Iwanaga and Friends and Swen Wiehen and Friends

lso.co.uk/groups lso.co.uk 2015/16 Highlights 3

LSO Season 2015/16 Highlights Concerts at the Barbican

London’s Symphony Orchestra

2015/16 SEASON OPENING CREATIVE GENIUSES MAN OF THE THEATRE SHAKESPEARE 400 with Bernard Haitink with Sir Simon Rattle with with Sir and Gianandrea Noseda

Bruckner Symphony No 7 Debussy Pelléas et Mélisande Stravinsky The Firebird Mendelssohn Tue 15 Sep 2015 directed by Peter Sellars Fri 9 Oct 2015 A Midsummer Night’s Dream Sat 9 & Sun 10 Jan 2016 Tue 16 Feb 2016 Mahler Symphony No 4 Stravinsky The Rite of Spring Sun 20 Sep 2015 Ravel, Dutilleux and Delage Sun 11 Oct 2015 Berlioz Romeo and Juliet with Leonidas Kavakos Sun 28 Feb 2016 Brahms Symphony No 1 Wed 13 Jan 2016 Bartók The Miraculous Mandarin Wed 23 Sep 2015 Sun 18 Oct 2015 Bruckner Symphony No 8 Thu 14 Apr 2016 020 7638 8891 lso.co.uk 4 Programme Notes 14 June 2015

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–91) Violin Concerto No 3 in G major K216 (1775)

1 ALLEGRO lyricism and an eloquent personal expressiveness 2 ADAGIO which we now recognise as being unique to the 3 RONDEAU: ALLEGRO composer, but which at the time marked a new stage in his artistic development. As he once ALINA IBRAGIMOVA VIOLIN wrote to his father after hearing another violinist play a particularly demanding concerto, ‘I am no Although the prevailing image of Mozart the lover of difficulties’. performer is that of a pianist, the part played by the violin in his early development as a musician was Mozart’s First Violin Concerto was composed in the an equally important one. How, indeed, could it be spring of 1773, and his second just over two years PROGRAMME NOTE WRITER otherwise when his father and teacher, Leopold, later in June 1775. Yet the most startling advance in LINDSAY KEMP is a senior was the author of Violinschule, one of the 18th artistic inspiration and identity occurs not between producer for BBC Radio 3, including century’s most influential and trenchant treatises these two, but in the three months which separate programming lunchtime concerts on violin technique? Accounts of the child prodigy’s the Second Concerto from the Third, which was from Wigmore Hall and LSO St Luke’s, triumphs throughout Europe suggest that, at that completed on 12 September. Suddenly, we are Artistic Director of the London stage at least, he was equally proficient on violin and hearing the 19-year-old Mozart as we know him Festival of Baroque Music, and keyboard, and right into the mid-1770s his letters from the great piano concertos of the 1780s – a regular contributor to home to his father contained reports of appearances elegant, witty, beguilingly changeable and, above Gramophone magazine. as a violinist. ‘I performed a symphony and played all, capable of writing music of surpassing beauty. Vanhal’s Violin Concerto in B-flat, which was unanimously applauded’, he wrote from Augsburg FIRST MOVEMENT in 1777. ‘In the evening at supper I played my The first movement finds Mozart in the rare act of Strasbourg concerto which went like oil. Everyone borrowing material from another work, the opening praised my beautiful, pure tone.’ orchestral section being based on an aria from his recent opera Il re pastore (The Shepherd King), in Despite these peripatetic successes, it was which the main character sings of his love for the Salzburg which was really the spiritual home of shepherd’s lot, unaware that he is of royal blood. Mozart’s violin music. It was there – where violin The implied mixture of nobility and carefree concerto movements were as likely to be heard contentment could not be a more apt way of as outdoor evening entertainment music or as an characterising the concerto movement. embellishment to a church service as in a concert hall – that he first played a concerto at the age SECOND MOVEMENT of seven, later toiled in the court orchestra, and, It is the slow movement, however, which has won between 1773 and 1775, composed his five violin this concerto a place in people’s hearts. ‘An adagio concertos. They may not probe the depths of his that seems to have fallen straight from heaven,’ is later Viennese piano concertos, but it is true to how the Mozart scholar Alfred Einstein described say that they all show some degree of Mozartian it, and indeed this is a movement that exhibits to inspiration, often of the most ravishing kind. The an outstanding degree that God-given talent for accent here is not on technical brilliance but on serene melodic perfection that was Mozart’s alone. lso.co.uk Programme Notes 5

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Composer Profile

The nocturnal sound-world, too, is new to the violin Born in Salzburg on 27 January 1756, Mozart began concertos, with the orchestral strings muted and the to pick out tunes on his father’s keyboard before his oboes giving way to softer-toned flutes. fourth birthday. His first compositions were written down in the early months of 1761; later that year, FINALE the boy performed in public for the first time at the The ‘rondeau’ finale demonstrates another feature University of Salzburg. Mozart’s ambitious father, that was to colour many of Mozart’s later concertos, Leopold, court composer and Vice-Kapellmeister to namely a greater independence given to the wind the Prince-Archbishop of Salzburg, recognised the section, which even has the work’s final say. More money-making potential of his precocious son and noticeable, however, is the element of knowing pupil, embarking on a series of tours to the major skittishness that it introduces, nowhere more so courts and capital cities of Europe. than when, after the cheerful main theme has made its third appearance, orchestral pizzicatos In 1777 Wolfgang, now 21 and frustrated with life accompany an exaggeratedly powdered French-style as a musician-in-service at Salzburg, left home, gavotte, and then a more rustic tune is heard with visiting the court at Mannheim on the way to Paris. bagpipe-like drones from the soloist. Scholarship has The Parisian public gave the former child prodigy revealed this tune to be a popular song of the day a lukewarm reception, and he struggled to make known as ‘The Strasbourger’, and that this concerto money by teaching and composing new pieces is therefore the one that Mozart performed ‘like oil’. for wealthy patrons. A failed love affair and the The music lovers of Augsburg were fortunate indeed! death of his mother prompted Mozart to return to Salzburg, where he accepted the post of Court and Cathedral Organist.

In 1780 he was commissioned to write an opera, Idomeneo, for the Bavarian court in Munich, where he was treated with great respect. However, the servility demanded by his Salzburg employer finally provoked Mozart to resign in 1781 and move to Vienna in search of a more suitable position, fame and fortune. In the last decade of his life, he produced a series of masterpieces in all the principal INTERVAL – 20 minutes genres of music, including the operas The Marriage There are bars on all levels of the Concert Hall; ice cream of Figaro (1785), Don Giovanni (1787), Così fan tutte can be bought at the stands on Stalls and Circle level. and The Magic Flute, the Symphonies Nos 40 and The Barbican shop will also be open. 41 (‘Jupiter’), a series of sublime piano concertos, a clarinet quintet and the Requiem, left incomplete Why not tweet us your thoughts on the first half of the at his death on 5 December 1791. performance @londonsymphony, or come and talk to LSO staff at the Information Desk on the Circle level? Composer Profile © Andrew Stewart 6 Programme Notes 14 June 2015

Gustav Mahler (1860–1911) Symphony No 1 in D major (‘Titan’) (1884–88, rev 1893–96)

1 LANGSAM. SCHLEPPEND [SLOW. DRAGGING] – Still, there’s much more to Mahler’s First Symphony IMMER SEHR GEMÄCHLICH than innovative orchestral colours and effects. When [ALWAYS AT A VERY LEISURELY PACE] the symphony was first performed it had a title, 2 KRÄFTIG BEWEGT, DOCH NICHT ZU SCHNELL ‘Titan’, taken from the once-famous novel by the [WITH STRONG MOVEMENT, BUT NOT TOO FAST] – German Romantic writer Jean Paul (the pen name 3 TRIO: RECHT GEMÄCHLICH [QUITE LEISURELY] – of Johann Paul Richter). For Richter the ‘Titan’, the TEMPO PRIMO true genius, is a ‘Heaven-Stormer’ (Himmelsstürmer) FEIERLICH UND GEMESSEN, OHNE ZU SCHLEPPEN an obsessive, almost recklessly passionate idealist. [SOLEMN AND MEASURED, WITHOUT DRAGGING] The idea appealed strongly to Mahler, but so too did 4 STÜRMISCH BEWEGT [STORMY] Richter’s vividly poetic descriptions of nature. For the premiere, Mahler set out his version of the Titan When Gustav Mahler began his First Symphony theme in an explanatory programme note, which told in 1884, ‘modern music’ meant Wagner, while the how the symphony progressed from ‘the awakening standard by which new symphonies were judged of nature at early dawn’, through youthful happiness was that of Brahms, the arch ‘classical-romantic’. and love, to the sardonic gloom of the funeral march, PROGRAMME NOTE WRITER In a Brahmsian symphony there was little room and then to the finale, subtitled ‘From Inferno to STEPHEN JOHNSON is the author for Wagnerian lush harmonies or sensational new Paradise’. And it was clear that Mahler’s interest in of Bruckner Remembered (Faber). orchestral colours. In fact the orchestral forces Richter’s theme was more than literary. Behind the He also contributes regularly to BBC Brahms employed were basically the same as symphony, he hinted to friends, was the memory of Music Magazine and The Guardian, those used by Beethoven and Schubert in their a love affair that had ended, painfully, at about the and broadcasts for BBC Radio 3 symphonies, three-quarters of a century earlier. time he began work on the symphony. (Discovering Music), BBC Radio 4 and the BBC World Service. So for audiences brought up on Brahms, hearing But Mahler soon began to lose faith in programmes. Mahler’s First Symphony would have been like ‘I would like it stressed that the symphony is greater stepping into a new world. The opening can still than the love affair it is based on’, he wrote. ‘The surprise even today: one note, an A, is spread real affair became the reason for, but by no means through almost the entire range of the string section, the true meaning of, the work.’ In later life he could topped with ghostly violin harmonics. Other unusual be blunt: when someone raised the subject at an colours follow: distant trumpet fanfares, high clarinet evening drinks party, Mahler is said to have leapt to cuckoo-calls, a plaintive cor anglais, the bell-like bass his feet and shouted, ‘Perish all programmes!’. But for notes of the harp. All this would have been startlingly most listeners, music that is so passionate, dramatic new in Mahler’s time. And there’s nothing tentative and so full of the sounds of nature can’t be fully or experimental about this symphonic debut: at 24, explained in the detached terms of ‘pure’ musical Mahler knows precisely the sound he wants, and analysis. Fortunately the First Symphony is full of precisely how to get it. pointers to possible meanings beyond the notes. lso.co.uk Programme Notes 7

IN BRIEF FIRST MOVEMENT THIRD MOVEMENT Mahler titled his symphony ‘Titan’ The main theme of the first movement – heard on The third movement is in complete contrast. This after a novel by the writer cellos and basses after the slow atmospheric ‘dawn’ is an eerie, sardonic funeral march, partly inspired Jean Paul and initially set out introduction – is taken from the second of Mahler’s by a painting by Jacques Callot, ‘The Huntsman’s the narrative and inspiration that four Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen (Songs of Funeral’, in which a procession of animals carry lay behind the music, although he a Wayfarer), written as a ‘memorial’ to his affair the hunter to his grave. One by one, the orchestral later abandoned this programme. with the singer Johanna Richter (no relation of the instruments enter quietly, playing a famous old novelist, but the name connection is striking). In nursery tune, Frère Jacques – which sounds like The first movement opens with the song, a young man, jilted in love, sets out on another interesting name connection, except that a slow, atmospheric introduction, a beautiful spring morning, hoping that nature will Austrians like Mahler would have known the tune depicting dawn and the awakening help his own heart to heal. For most of the first to the words ‘Brother Martin, are you sleeping?’. of nature, followed by a rustic movement, Mahler seems to share the young man’s At the heart of this movement, Mahler makes a second movement, based on the hope. The ending seems cheerful enough. But at the lengthy quotation from the last of the Lieder eines Ländler, an Austrian country dance. heart of the movement comes a darkly mysterious fahrenden Gesellen. The song tells in soft, gentle The third movement, by contrast, passage, echoing the ‘dawn’ introduction, but adding tones of how a young man, stricken with grief at is an eerie, sardonic funeral march sinister new sounds: the low, quiet growl of a tuba, the loss of the girl he loves, finds consolation in (featuring a minor-key version ominous drum-beats, and a repeated sighing figure the thought of death. This is the dark heart of the of Frère Jacques). The finale for cellos. For a moment, the music seems to echo First Symphony. completes the story, journeying the final words of the song: ‘So will my joy blossom through stormy turbulence to a too? No, no; it will never, never bloom again’. FINALE triumphant conclusion. But this is not the end of the story. In the finale SECOND MOVEMENT Mahler strives onward – in the words of the Dance music dominates the second movement, discarded programme, ‘From Inferno to Paradise’. especially the robust, earthy vigour of the Ländler At first all is turbulence, but when the storm has died (the country cousin of the sophisticated urban down, strings present an ardent, slower melody – Waltz). There are hints here of another, earlier unmistakably a love theme. There’s a brief memory song, Hans und Grete, in which gawky young Hans of the first movement’s ‘dawn’ music, then the finds a sweetheart at a village dance – all innocent struggle begins again. Eventually massed horns happiness. But the slower, more reflective Trio brings introduce a new, radiantly hopeful theme, strongly more adult expression: nostalgia and, later, sarcasm reminiscent of ‘And he shall reign’ from Handel’s (shrill high woodwind). oratorio Messiah. More reminiscences and still more heroic struggles follow, until dark introspection is finally overcome, and the symphony ends in jubilation. Mahler’s hero has survived to live, and love, another day. 8 Composer Profile 14 June 2015

Mahler the Man by Stephen Johnson

obsession with mortality in Mahler’s music. Few of his major works do not feature a funeral march: in fact Mahler’s first composition (at age ten) was I am … a Funeral March with Polka – exactly the kind of three times homeless extreme juxtaposition one finds in his mature works. a native of Bohemia in Austria For most of his life Mahler supported himself by conducting, but this was no mere means to an end. an Austrian among Germans Indeed his evident talent and energetic, disciplined commitment led to successive appointments a Jew throughout the world. at Prague, Leipzig, Budapest, Hamburg and climactically, in 1897, the Vienna Court Opera. In the midst of this hugely demanding schedule, Mahler composed whenever he could, usually during his summer holidays. The rate at which he composed during these brief periods is astonishing. Mahler’s sense of being an outsider, coupled with The workload in no way decreased after his marriage a penetrating, restless intelligence, made him an to the charismatic and highly intelligent Alma Schindler acutely self-conscious searcher after truth. For Mahler in 1902. Alma’s infidelity – which almost certainly the purpose of art was, in Shakespeare’s famous accelerated the final decline in Mahler’s health in phrase, to ‘hold the mirror up to nature’ in all its 1910/11 – has earned her black marks from some bewildering richness. The symphony, he told Jean biographers; but it is hard not to feel some sympathy Sibelius, ‘must be like the world. It must embrace for her position as a ‘work widow’. everything’. Mahler’s symphonies can seem almost over-full with intense emotions and ideas: love and Nevertheless, many today have good cause to hate, joy in life and terror of death, the beauty of be grateful to Mahler for his single-minded devotion nature, innocence and bitter experience. Similar to his art. T S Eliot – another artist caught between themes can also be found in his marvellous songs the search for faith and the horror of meaninglessness – and song-cycles, though there the intensity is, wrote that ‘humankind cannot bear very much reality’. if anything, still more sharply focused. But Mahler’s music suggests another possibility. With his ability to confront the terrifying possibility of a Gustav Mahler was born the second of 14 children. purposeless universe and the empty finality of death, His parents were apparently ill-matched (Mahler Mahler can help us confront and endure stark reality. remembered violent scenes), and young Gustav He can take us to the edge of the abyss, then sing grew dreamy and introspective, seeking comfort us the sweetest songs of consolation. If we allow in nature rather than human company. Death was ourselves to make this journey with him, we may a presence from early on: six of Mahler’s siblings find that we too are the better for it. died in infancy. This no doubt partly explains the lso.co.uk Artist Biographies 9

Bernard Haitink ‘It is business as usual, except that ‘usual’ inevitably Conductor means superb, definitive.’ The Sunday Times on Bernard Haitink with the LSO

Bernard Haitink’s 2014/15 season began with a He has made frequent guest appearances with concert with the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic most of the world’s leading orchestras, and Orchestra, marking the 60th anniversary of Haitink’s celebrated another milestone in March 2014 when conducting debut with that orchestra. Other he conducted the Berlin Philharmonic in concerts engagements this past season included the opening marking the 50th anniversary of his debut with concert of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra’s them. He is committed to the development of young season, four programmes with the LSO in London, musical talent, and gives an annual Conducting Madrid and Paris, and concerts with the Chamber Masterclass at the Lucerne Easter Festival. Orchestra of Europe in Lucerne, Amsterdam and Paris. He also conducted the Berlin Philharmonic in Bernard Haitink has recorded extensively with the the Baden-Baden Easter Festival, and returned to the Royal Orchestra, the Berlin and Chicago and Boston Symphony Orchestras. During Vienna Philharmonic Orchestras, the London and the summer 2015 festival season he conducts the Chicago Symphony Orchestras and the Bavarian Vienna Philharmonic in the Salzburg Festival and Radio Symphony Orchestra. He has received many the opening concerts in the Lucerne Festival with awards and honours in recognition of his services the Lucerne Festival Orchestra, as well as concerts to music, including an honorary Knighthood and Conductor Emeritus in Lucerne and the BBC Proms with the Chamber Companion of Honour. Boston Symphony Orchestra Orchestra of Europe. Next season includes a return to Japan with the London Symphony Orchestra. Patron Netherlands Radio Haitink was Chief Conductor of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra Concertgebouw Orchestra for 27 years, Music Director of Glyndebourne Festival Opera and The Royal Opera, Covent Garden, and Principal Conductor of the Staatskapelle Dresden, the London Philharmonic and the Chicago Symphony Orchestras. He is Conductor Emeritus of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and Patron of the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra. 10 Artist Biographies 14 June 2015

Alina Ibragimova ‘Alina Ibragimova is one of the most richly Violin talented and expressive of violinists.’ The Guardian

Performing music from Baroque to new As soloist/director Alina has toured with the commissions on both modern and period Kremerata Baltica, Britten Sinfonia, Academy of instruments, Alina Ibragimova has appeared with Ancient Music, and the Australian Chamber Orchestra. orchestras including the LSO, Konzerthausorchester Berlin, Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, With regular recital partner Cédric Tiberghien, and WDR Sinfonieorchester Köln, Stuttgart Radio in solo and chamber music, Alina has appeared at Symphony, Orquestre Philharmonique de Radio- venues including the Wigmore Hall, Concertgebouw, France, Mariinsky Theatre Orchestra, Seattle Mozarteum, Musikverein, Carnegie Hall, Palais des Symphony, Philharmonia, Orchestra of the Age of Beaux Arts, Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, Vancouver Enlightenment, Hallé, and all the BBC orchestras. Recital Series, San Francisco Performances, Conductors with whom Alina has worked include and at festivals including Salzburg, Verbier, Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Valery Gergiev, Paavo Järvi, MDR Musiksommer, Manchester International, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, , Rafael Lockenhaus and Aldeburgh. The next two seasons’ Frühbeck de Burgos, Sir , Sir Mark recital highlights include a complete Mozart sonata Elder, Philippe Herreweghe, Osmo Vänskä, Hannu cycle at the Wigmore Hall and at the Oji Hall in Tokyo, Lintu, Sakari Oramo, Ilan Volkov, Tugan Sokhiev, a Lucerne Festival debut, and solo Bach recitals Jakub Hrusa, Ludovic Morlot, Edward Gardner and at the Park Avenue Armory recital series in New Gianandrea Noseda. York, Gulbenkian Auditorium in Lisbon, Barcelona Auditorium and Tokyo’s Oji Hall. Highlights among future concerto plans include return engagements with the Bergen Philharmonic Born in Russia in 1985 Alina studied at the Moscow (Berg with Edward Gardner), Royal Liverpool Gnesin School before moving with her family to Philharmonic (Tchaikovsky), and debuts with the the UK in 1995 where she studied at the Yehudi Philadelphia Orchestra (Mozart 4 with Vladimir Menuhin School and . She was Jurowski), Cleveland Orchestra (Sibelius with Juanjo also a member of the Kronberg Academy Masters Mena), Montreal Symphony (Beethoven with Kent programme. Alina’s teachers have included Natasha Nagano), Hungarian National Philharmonic (Bartók 2 Boyarsky, Gordan Nikolitch and Christian Tetzlaff. with Zoltán Kocsis), Bamberger Symphoniker (Ravel with Robin Ticciati), Scottish Chamber Orchestra Alina has been the recipient of awards including (Schumann with Robin Ticciati), as well as a tour in the Royal Philharmonic Society Young Artist Award Australia with the Sibelius Violin Concerto. 2010, the Borletti-Buitoni Trust Award 2008, and the Classical BRIT Young Performer of the Year Award Alina is a featured artist in the 2015 BBC Proms 2009. She was a member of the BBC New Generation season, performing J S Bach’s complete solo Sonatas Artists Scheme 2005–7. Alina records for Hyperion and Partitas, Bach and Vivaldi concertos with Records and performs on a c 1775 Anselmo Bellosio Apollo’s Fire, and the Mendelssohn Concerto with violin kindly provided by Georg von Opel. the Bergen Philharmonic. lso.co.uk LSO International Violin Festival 11

Alina Ibragimova LSO International Violin Festival: Artist Focus

Ever since I first moved to London, my father worked in the LSO as Principal Double Bass, so I know everyone. These are faces I’ve seen on stage – I grew up with them.

Playing with the LSO was always something I dreamt of when I was young. It’s very special – the dynamic experience of going to an LSO concert is unforgettable.

Alina Ibragimova, on working with the LSO

LSO INTERNATIONAL VIOLIN Alina Ibragimova has played an Anselmo Bellosio is the LSO’s Principal Double Bass, and her teacher FESTIVAL: FIND OUT MORE violin for nine years. Bellosio was in many ways one at the Royal College of Music was LSO Leader of the last of the great Venetian luthiers – certainly Gordan Nikolitch. Alina made her debut with the Get to know the soloists in the the last of the Classical period. His beautifully Orchestra in 2007 at the BBC Proms, and has since LSO International Violin Festival elegant creations are cut from very handsome wood performed on the Barbican stage, on tour and in and find out more about their and clothed in fine red-brown varnish that stands BBC Radio 3 Lunchtime Concerts at LSO St Luke’s. instruments on our website, comparison with the best of the 18th century. featuring in-depth profiles, Tonight will be her first time working with Bernard interviews, live-streamed artist The instrument played by Alina Ibragimova dates Haitink as a soloist (she performed with him once conversations and more. from around 1775. ‘It’s beautiful, it’s very dark,’ she before, while still a student at the RCM, as the says. ‘It has more golden colours. I’ve heard people orchestra’s leader in Bruckner’s Seventh Symphony) lso.co.uk/violinfestival say that it reminds them more of a viola at times; and her first time performing this Mozart concerto. it’s got that kind of range.’ ‘It was actually Bernard Haitink’s choice, which is great because it meant that I had to learn it,’ she Alina’s relationship with the LSO goes back many says. ‘It’s in G major, very operatic, very beautiful; years, not least because her father, Rinat Ibragimov, I’m really excited about playing it!’ 12 The Orchestra 14 June 2015

London Symphony Orchestra Your views On stage Inbox

FIRST VIOLINS VIOLAS FLUTES HORNS TIMPANI Richard Coleman Gordan Nikolitch Leader Edward Vanderspar Adam Walker Timothy Jones Nigel Thomas Marathon concert @londonsymphony Lennox Mackenzie Gillianne Haddow Alex Jakeman Samuel Jacobs Antoine Bedewi Clare Duckworth Malcolm Johnston Gareth Davies Jonathan Durrant tonight, but totally worth it for epic Mahler Nigel Broadbent German Clavijo Alexander Edmundson PERCUSSION 5. Magnificent playing, esp from trumpet PICCOLO Neil Percy Ginette Decuyper Lander Echevarria Jonathan Bareham & French horn. Gerald Gregory Anna Bastow Sharon Williams Andrew Budden David Jackson Maxine Kwok-Adams Julia O’Riordan Hugh Seenan Sam Walton on the LSO with Daniel Harding and OBOES Claire Parfitt Robert Turner Brendan Thomas Timothy Rundle HARP Janine Jansen on 2 June Elizabeth Pigram Heather Wallington Katie Bennington Bryn Lewis Laurent Quenelle Jonathan Welch TRUMPETS Joseph Sanders Harriet Rayfield Fiona Dalgliesh Philip Cobb Amy Yuan Gerald Ruddock Ian Rhodes Richard Holttum COR ANGLAIS Simon Cox Favourite music and people on one evening! Sylvain Vasseur Sarah Harper Shlomy Dobrinsky CELLOS Paul Mayes @londonsymphony Daniel Harding with Julia Rumley Tim Hugh CLARINETS David Geoghegan Janine Jansen. Peerless! What a treat! Helena Smart Minat Lyons Andrew Marriner OFF–STAGE Alastair Blayden Jane Calderbank on the LSO with Daniel Harding and TRUMPETS SECOND VIOLINS Jennifer Brown Chi-Yu Mo Janine Jansen on 2 June David Alberman Noel Bradshaw Daniel Newell Sarah Quinn Eve-Marie Caravassilis BASS CLARINET Martin Hurrell David Ballesteros Hilary Jones Lorenzo Iosco Robert Smith Howard Sussman Richard Blayden Amanda Truelove E-FLAT CLARINET TROMBONES It was worth travelling from the US to Matthew Gardner Orlando Jopling Chi-Yu Mo Dudley Bright Julian Gil Rodriguez Deborah Tolksdorf hear the LSO. I was not disappointed. James Maynard Naoko Keatley BASSOONS We loved it. DOUBLE BASSES Rebecca Smith Belinda McFarlane Rachel Gough Colin Paris on the LSO with Valery Gergiev and William Melvin Joost Bosdijk BASS TROMBONE Nicholas Worters Iwona Muszynska Paul Milner Nikolaj Znaider on 12 May Andrew Pollock Patrick Laurence CONTRA BASSOON Paul Robson Matthew Gibson Dominic Morgan TUBA Ingrid Button Thomas Goodman Patrick Harrild Gabrielle Painter Joe Melvin Jani Pensola Jeremy Watt

LSO STRING EXPERIENCE SCHEME

Established in 1992, the LSO String Experience The Scheme is supported by London Symphony Orchestra Editor Scheme enables young string players at the Help Musicians UK Barbican Edward Appleyard start of their professional careers to gain The Garrick Charitable Trust Silk Street [email protected] work experience by playing in rehearsals The Lefever Award London and concerts with the LSO. The scheme The Polonsky Foundation EC2Y 8DS Photography auditions students from the London music Igor Emmerich, Kevin Leighton, conservatoires, and 15 students per year Taking part in both the rehearsals and Registered charity in England No 232391 Bill Robinson, Alberto Venzago are selected to participate. The musicians the performance of this concert were: Details in this publication were correct Print Cantate 020 3651 1690 are treated as professional ’extra’ players Esther Kim, Felix Lashmar and Lourenco Sampaio. at time of going to press. (additional to LSO members) and receive fees Advertising Cabbell Ltd 020 3603 7937 for their work in line with LSO section players.