A Dance to the Music of Time – Ravel, Say and Rachmaninoff. Spellbinding storytellers, dancing ghosts and melodies that will stay with you forever.The fairy-tale heroine Scheherazade must keep her audience entertained on pain of death in the One Thousand and One Nights. In Fazil Say’s concerto, the violin plays the part of the endlessly fascinating tale-teller. The piece is paired with impassioned music originally written for the ballet: Ravel’s haunting waltz and Rachmaninoff’s mysterious Symphonic Dances. Ravel imagined whirling couples in a Viennese concert hall in music that seems haunted by World War I. Rachmaninoff also conjures up a ghostly waltz, amid the expressive melodies of the last music he ever wrote. PROGRAM Ravel: La valse; Fazil Say: Violin Concerto (1001 Nights in the Harem); Rachmaninoff: Symphonic Dances
LSO: Pappano conducts Boulanger, Barber & Rachmaninoff
The sun comes out in Lili Boulanger’s lively tone poem, and lyrical feelings bloom in music by Samuel Barber and Serge Rachmaninoff. D’un matin de printemps is one of the few glimpses we have of Lili Boulanger’s compositional genius, a sparkling miniature that leaves a lasting impression of spring. The emotional sincerity of Samuel Barber’s lyrical Violin Concerto cuts to the heart, its nervy third movement building up to a burst of feeling. And passion reigns in Rachmaninoff’s opulent Second Symphony. Its third movement contains some of the most beautiful music he ever wrote. PROGRAM Boulanger: D’un Matin de printemps; Barber: Violin Concerto; Rachmaninoff: Symphony No. 2