Scheherazade
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CONCERT PROGRAM Scheherazade Master Series Thursday Master Series Friday Great Classics on Monday Thursday 1 October at 8pm Friday 2 October at 8pm Monday 5 October at 6.30pm Arts Centre Melbourne, Arts Centre Melbourne, Arts Centre Melbourne, Hamer Hall Hamer Hall Hamer Hall WHAT’S ON OCTOBER – DECEMBER 2015 AN AMERICAN IN PARIS TCHAIKOVSKY AND GRIEG SIBELIUS’ FINLANDIA Friday 30 October Friday 13 November Thursday 19 November Saturday 14 November Friday 20 November Gershwin’s An American in Paris evokes a journey through the Asher Fisch conducts three Yan Pascal Tortelier celebrates the bustling streets of the French masterworks that defined the 150th anniversary of two Nordic capital, punctuated by taxi horns Romantic era. Tchaikovsky’s masters. Sibelius’ majestic Finlandia and a bluesy trumpet solo. Also stirring Romeo and Juliet is followed is balanced against Nielsen’s spirited featured in this program is by Grieg’s poignant Piano Concerto Violin Concerto. Also featured in this Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G and and the high-voltage intensity program is Sibelius’ Symphony No.5 Saint-Saëns’ Symphony No.3 Organ. of Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony. and tone poem The Swan of Tuonela. BRAHMS AND TCHAIKOVSKY MESSIAH CHRISTMAS CAROLS Thursday 26 November Saturday 5 December Saturday 12 December Friday 27 November Sunday 6 December Sunday 13 December Saturday 28 November Join conductor Bramwell Tovey, Bramwell Tovey joins the MSO Divertimento, Bartók’s dark take the MSO Chorus and renowned as conductor, pianist and host on the Baroque, kick-starts this international soloists for one of in this celebration of the great night of European festivities. the MSO’s most beloved Christmas musical traditions of Christmas, Brahms’ Violin Concerto delivers traditions, Handel’s Messiah. from famous orchestral works and a fiery, gypsy-inspired rondo and favourite Christmas songs to the Tchaikovsky’s Serenade for Strings most beloved of Yuletide carols. pays homage to Mozart. 2 REPERTOIRE Melbourne Symphony Orchestra Jakub Hrůša conductor Jack Liebeck violin Smetana The Bartered Bride: Overture Dvořák Violin Concerto — Interval — Rimsky-Korsakov Scheherazade This concert has a duration of approximately 2 hours Pre-Concert Talks including one 20 minute interval. 7pm Thursday 1 October, Stalls Foyer, Hamer Hall 7pm Friday 2 October, Stalls Foyer, Hamer Hall Friday evening’s performance will be recorded for broadcast on ABC Classic FM at 1pm on Saturday Megan Burslem will present a talk on the artists and 17 October. works featured in the program. Post-Concert Conversation 8.30pm Monday 5 October, Stalls Foyer, Hamer Hall Join MSO Director of Artistic Planning Ronald Vermeulen for a post-concert conversation with Master Series Partner conductor Jakub Hrůša. 3 WELCOME I was privileged to attend a concert in 2014 in which Jakub Hrůša conducted the first ever performance by the MSO of Smetana’s complete Má vlast – and what a great performance it was! So it is with the greatest pleasure that we welcome Jakub back to conduct more music from his native Czech Republic: Smetana’s rousing overture to his opera The Bartered Bride and, with soloist Jack Liebeck, Dvořák’s songful and enchanting Violin Concerto, one of my personal favourites. We move from Prague to Saint Petersburg for the evening’s main event. Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade, a work whose dazzling orchestral colour and dramatic evocation of the exotic East make a mockery of the composer’s over-modest assessment of himself as ‘an officer- dilettante who sometimes enjoys playing and listening to music’! I know you will be thrilled tonight both by the MSO’s extraordinary virtuosity and by Jakub Hrůša’s dynamism as an interpreter of the Eastern European repertoire. I wish I could be here too! Sir Andrew Davis Chief Conductor The Melbourne Symphony Orchestra acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the Land on which we perform – The Kulin Nation – and would like to pay our respects to their Elders and Community both past and present. 4 MELBOURNE SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA With a reputation for excellence, versatility and innovation, the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra is Australia’s oldest orchestra, established in 1906. The Orchestra currently performs live to more than 200,000 people annually, in concerts ranging from subscription performances at its home, Hamer Hall at Arts Centre Melbourne, to its annual free concerts at Melbourne’s largest outdoor venue, the Sidney Myer Music Bowl. Sir Andrew Davis gave his inaugural concerts as Chief Conductor of the MSO in April 2013, having made his debut with the Orchestra in 2009. Highlights of his tenure have included collaborations with artists including Bryn Terfel, Emanuel Ax and Truls Mørk, the release of recordings of music by Richard Strauss, Charles Ives, Percy Grainger and Eugene Goossens, a 2014 European Festivals tour, and a multi-year cycle of Mahler’s Symphonies. The MSO also works each season with Principal Guest Conductor Diego Matheuz, Associate Conductor Benjamin Northey and the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra Chorus. Recent guest conductors to the MSO have included Thomas Adès, John Adams, Tan Dun, Charles Dutoit, Jakub Hrůša, Mark Wigglesworth, Markus Stenz and Simone Young. The Orchestra has also collaborated with non-classical musicians including Burt Bacharach, Ben Folds, Nick Cave, Sting and Tim Minchin. The MSO reaches an even larger audience through its regular concert broadcasts on ABC Classic FM, also streamed online, and through recordings on Chandos and ABC Classics. The MSO’s Education and Community Engagement initiatives deliver innovative and engaging programs to audiences of all ages, including MSO Learn, an educational iPhone and iPad app designed to teach children about the inner workings of an orchestra. The Melbourne Symphony Orchestra is funded principally by the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body, and is generously supported by the Victorian Government through Creative Victoria, Department of Economic Development, Jobs, Transport and Resources. The MSO is also funded by the City of Melbourne, its Principal Partner, Emirates, corporate sponsors and individual donors, trusts and foundations. 5 JAKUB HRŮŠA JACK LIEBECK CONDUCTOR VIOLIN Born in the Czech Republic, Jakub Hrůša has served Born in London, Jack Liebeck has appeared with all as Music Director and Chief Conductor of Prague of the major British orchestras, and internationally Philharmonia since 2009. He is also Principal Guest with the Royal Stockholm and Oslo Philharmonic Conductor of Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra, Orchestras, Moscow State Symphony Orchestra, where he recently extended his commitment through Orquesta Sinfónica de Navarra, Real Filharmonía to the 2017/ 18 season. de Galicia, National Orchestra of Belgium, Lausanne Chamber Orchestra, Polish National Radio Symphony He is a regular guest with many of the world’s Orchestra, Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra, and leading orchestras, including the Philharmonia Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, among others. Orchestra, Czech Philharmonic, Leipzig Gewandhaus Recently he performed Dario Marianelli’s especially Orchestra, Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra, commissioned Voyager Violin Concerto with the WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne, Orchestre Queensland Symphony Orchestra in a lecture/concert Philharmonique de Radio France, The Cleveland with renowned physicist Brian Cox. A committed Orchestra, and the Sydney and Melbourne Symphony recitalist and chamber musician, he has also appeared Orchestras. Recent highlights included Bohemian in recital at London’s Wigmore Hall, and in 2013 Legends, a major series with the Philharmonia became the violinist of Trio Dali. Orchestra devoted to the music of Dvořák, Suk and Janáček, and debuts with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, This season he makes his Gewandhaus debut Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, Russian National with the MDR Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra Orchestra, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and Finnish performing Magnus Lindberg’s Violin Concerto, and National Opera (Jenůfa). In the field of opera, he has also performs Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto with the been a regular guest with the Glyndebourne Festival BBC Philharmonic and Brahms’ Violin Concerto with and Glyndebourne Tour, conducting Carmen, The Turn the Orchestra of Opera North. He appeared at this year’s of the Screw, Don Giovanni, La bohème and Rusalka. BBC Proms with the BBC Concert Orchestra conducted by Barry Wordsworth. This year Jakub Hrůša debuts with The Philadelphia Orchestra, Vienna Symphony, Bamberg Symphony Jack Liebeck is a professor of violin at the Royal Orchestra, RAI National Symphony Orchestra, Academy of Music and Artistic Director of Oxford Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin and Paris Opera. May Music Festival, a festival of music, science and the arts. His recordings include Dvořák’s Violin Concerto, Jakub Hrůša studied conducting at the Academy of winner of a 2010 Classical Brit Award, and the complete Performing Arts in Prague. Brahms violin sonatas with Katya Apekisheva. 6 BEDŘICH SMETANA The Bartered Bride: Overture (1824–1884) In a breathless overture to the work that gave his long-suffering fellow-countrymen their own operatic identity, Smetana encapsulates the vitality and bustle, as well as the rustic charm, of a Czech village in festive mood. This was the first time Czech village life had been portrayed believably in opera. Although premiered inauspiciously in the shadow of a looming war with Bismarck’s Prussia, The Bartered