City Halls Glasgow 2022
Spring bbc.co.uk/ bbcsso
Your Safety In order to maximise the number of people who can come to our concerts and to offer the widest range of seats and ticket prices, our concerts will return to full capacity from January 2022. Under Scottish Government rules (at the time of going to press) you will still be required to wear a face covering at all our concerts for the duration of your visit, unless exempt. We also request that anyone over 18 attending our concerts should be doublevaccinated, or have recorded a negative lateral flow test within 48 hours prior to attending an event, or have natural immunity based on an antibody test taken within 180 days prior to attending a concert.
We strongly encourage all customers to adhere to this. We’re also working with the venue to ensure that enhanced cleaning and hand sanitiser stations remain in place. Please note that our Glasgow Series concerts have reserved seating but Afternoon Performance concerts are unreserved, so audience members can choose their own seats on the day. We will continue to review these safety measures throughout the coming months. Please check our website before your visit in case guidance has changed, or if new entry requirements have been introduced. bbc.co.uk/bbcsso
Welcome to the Spring 2022 Season If one thing has boosted our musicians since the return of live music to concert halls, it’s the support we’ve been shown by you, the audience. It’s been heartening to see and hear you cheering us on once more and so we’re thrilled to be able to offer you even more concerts from January onwards. We welcome Thomas Dausgaard back to City Halls with a cycle of symphonies by his fellow Dane, Carl Nielsen. These are Thomas’s last appearances in Glasgow as Chief Conductor and it’s fitting that he should crown his tenure with a complete survey of this extraordinary music. Ilan Volkov (Principal Guest Conductor) and Alpesh Chauhan (Associate Conductor) return, too, with typically distinctive programmes and our Artist in Residence, Jörg Widmann continues to showcase his remarkable talents.
We’ve stellar guests across the season, including conductors Marin Alsop and Sir Mark Elder, pianists Alexander Melnikov and Duo Jatekok, string soloists Abel Selaocoe and Rosanne Philippens, and outstanding singers such as Karen Cargill, Miah Persson, Sophie Bevan and Dame Sarah Connolly. Plus our series of daytime concerts, Afternoon Performance, is back. And, as ever, if you’re not ready to return to concerts in person, they will be broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and BBC Sounds, many of them live, and some available to watch on BBC iPlayer. Dominic Parker Director, BBC SSO
Images/ Thomas Dausgaard and Carl Nielsen
Nielsen The Complete Symphonies Boldly innovative, melodic, and generously humane, Carl Nielsen’s six symphonies are some of the most life-affirming ever written. Experience the complete cycle over the coming months and discover works that are by turn energising, searingly heartfelt, gripping, and ultimately uplifting. Our departing Chief Conductor, Thomas Dausgaard, whose recent interpretations of this music have been called ‘fresh’ and ‘fascinating’ by Gramophone, conducts all six symphonies.
Thursday 13.01.2022 7.30pm Bartók Divertimento for string orchestra (c.27 mins)
Erika Fox Piano Concerto BBC Commission, World Premiere (c.20 mins)
Nielsen Symphony No.3 ‘Sinfonia espansiva’ (c.35 mins) Julian Jacobson piano Thomas Dausgaard conductor
Dausgaard Conducts Nielsen Symphony No.3 Our Nielsen cycle begins with the composer’s buoyant, often magical, Third Symphony from 1911, the first to bring him international success and, as a work of the pre-war period, relatively free from the shadows and despair that can darken the later symphonies. It’s a perfect introduction to the composer’s work and Chief Conductor Thomas Dausgaard precedes it with Bartók’s equally vibrant Divertimento for strings. To herald the New Year, meanwhile, here’s new music in the form of a major World Premiere: a piano concerto by the great Vienneseborn composer Erika Fox, specially written for the fearless playing of Julian Jacobson.
Images/Duo Jatekok and Benjamin Beilman
Thursday 20.01.2022 7.30pm
Saint-Saëns ‘Organ’ Symphony
Tailleferre Marchand d’Oiseaux (Bird Seller)
1920s Paris was a melting pot of artistic tastes and styles. Among its stars were Les Six, whose music was defiantly short, punchy, stripped back, and insouciantly witty (a song based on a cocktail recipe, anyone?). In this concert the outstanding Duo Jatekok tackle Poulenc’s dizzying, dazzling concerto for two pianos while Ilan Volkov rediscovers the witty, mock-Baroque stylings of Les Six’s only female member, Germaine Tailleferre. And for contrast, just the sort of large-scale 19th century work Les Six were rebelling against: Saint-Saëns’s Third Symphony, a crowd-pleaser from its mysterious opening to its show-stopping, cymbal-clashing finale.
(c.19 mins)
Poulenc Concerto for two pianos (c.19 mins) Saint-Saëns Symphony No.3 ‘Organ’ (c.37 mins) Duo Jatekok (Naïri Badal and Adélaïde Panaget) pianos Ilan Volkov conductor
Thursday 03.02.2022 7.30pm
Korngold Violin Concerto
Korngold Violin Concerto (c.25 mins)
Korngold’s glamorous, glittering Violin Concerto is an extraordinary fusion of Hollywood and Old Vienna. Quoting themes from his movie scores of the 1930s, it was a late success for a composer who’d discovered his richly romantic music was perfect for the big screen. Here it will take flight in the hands of our wonderful soloist, Benjamin Beilman. Wagner’s The Mastersingers of Nuremberg was once described as ‘the longest smile in the German language’. After his thrilling interpretation of music from The Ring in 2019, conductor Antony Hermus returns to the BBC SSO with Henk de Vlieger’s distillation of the composer’s sunniest opera, a nonstop outpouring of warmth and melody, guaranteed to melt the hardest of hearts.
Wagner (arr. Henk de Vlieger) Meistersinger, an orchestral tribute (c.48 mins) Benjamin Beilman violin Antony Hermus conductor
Images/Alpesh Chauhan and Alexander Melnikov
Thursday 24.02.2022 7.30pm Webern Passacaglia (c.10 mins) Schönberg Song of the Wood Dove from Gurre-Lieder (chamber version) (c.13 mins)
Bruckner Symphony No.4 ‘Romantic’ (c.65 mins)
Bruckner Four Horns that seem to call to us from distant peaks. Strings that surge like mountain streams. Vistas that open up and expand before us. Bruckner’s Fourth Symphony is suffused with the spirit of nature, as it moves between moments of tender lyricism and thundering majesty. Associate Conductor Alpesh Chauhan guides us through its light and shade, linking it here with works by two composers on the brink of casting off such heady Romanticism: Webern’s Passacaglia and an excerpt from his teacher Schönberg’s mammoth Gurre-Lieder. Karen Cargill sings the lush Song of the Wood Dove, a part she has sung across the world.
Karen Cargill mezzo-soprano Alpesh Chauhan conductor
Thursday 03.03.2022 7.30pm
Brahms Piano Concerto No.1
Joanna Ward New Work
From its tempestuous opening bars, Brahms’s First Piano Concerto throws a gauntlet down to all-comers. It’s a monumental, powerhouse of a work, so we’re thrilled that the astonishing Alexander Melnikov joins us as tonight’s soloist. Today, it’s hard for us to hear how Brahms broke new ground with this concerto, but to keep that spirit of artistic revolution alive we have a World Premiere from composer, performer, researcher, and activist Joanna Ward, renowned for her cross-media explorations. Our Nielsen symphony cycle continues, too, with the composer’s ‘Simple Symphony’ which, despite the sunny outlook of its opening, has dark moments and unexpected twists on the horizon.
BBC Commission, World Premiere (c.10 mins)
Nielsen Symphony No.6 ‘Sinfonia semplice’ (c.35 mins) Brahms Piano Concerto No.1 (c.50 mins) Alexander Melnikov piano Thomas Dausgaard conductor
Images/Michael Sanderling and Rosanne Philippens
Thursday 10.03.2022 7.30pm
The Lark Ascending
Wagner Prelude & Liebestod from Tristan und Isolde (c.20 mins)
If full-blown emotion’s your thing, then look no further. Sibelius’s First is unquestionably the composer’s most Romantic symphony and often recalls Tchaikovsky at full tilt. Richard Wagner, too, gave everything when writing his epic opera of starcrossed lovers, so expect 100 percent passion and commitment from the orchestra under tonight’s conductor, Mark Wigglesworth. At the eye of the storm, however, all is calm. A lark, free from human angst, sings and soars above a pastoral landscape and time stands still. Every performance of Vaughan Williams’s most popular work is a special occasion and here the sensational Rosanne Philippens gives voice to the bird.
Vaughan Williams The Lark Ascending (c.15 mins) Sibelius Symphony No.1 (c.40 mins) Rosanne Philippens violin Mark Wigglesworth conductor
Thursday 24.03.2022 7.30pm Haydn Cello Concerto No.2 (c.26 mins) Mahler Symphony No.4* (c.57 mins) Alexey Stadler cello Miah Persson soprano* Michael Sanderling conductor
Mahler Four ‘With the coming of spring, I am calm again,’ wrote Gustav Mahler, and with its flurries of birdsong, and playful melodies, there’s something fresh and sprightly about his Fourth Symphony that recalls nature returning to full bloom. But in the ‘child’s vision of heaven’ with which it ends, the Fourth has depths as poignant and profound as anything Mahler ever wrote. Michael Sanderling wowed City Halls with Shostakovich’s Fifth at the start of 2020 and returns with Swedish soprano Miah Persson, and the Russian cellist Alexey Stadler who’s our soloist in Haydn’s sublime D major concerto. An evening so full of light you’ll believe – for once – that spring has truly arrived in Glasgow.
Images/Sir Mark Elder and Annelien Van Wauwe
Thursday 31.03.2022 7.30pm
Debussy’s ‘La Mer’
Debussy Marche écossaise (c.7 mins)
‘Music you can’t ignore’ is how The Guardian has referred to the music of the Flemish composer Wim Henderickx. His new Clarinet Concerto dedicated to tonight’s performer, Annelien Van Wauwe, is bound to be just as attention-grabbing and features a typical engagement with Eastern music and philosophy. Prepare to be beguiled. Martyn Brabbins has couched this World Premiere in the gorgeous, impressionistic sound-world of French music: Debussy’s famous depiction of an ever-changing seascape and his ‘march’ based upon a traditional Scottish tune; and Dame Sarah Connolly singing Chausson’s exquisite song-cycle of heartbreak and longing. An evening to ravish the ear.
Wim Henderickx Sutra (Clarinet Concerto) BBC Co-Commission, World Premiere (c.30 mins)
Chausson Poème de l’amour et de la mer* (c.30 mins)
Debussy La Mer (c.23 mins) Annelien Van Wauwe clarinet Sarah Connolly mezzo-soprano* Martyn Brabbins conductor
Thursday 14.04.2022 7.30pm
Ein Heldenleben with Sir Mark Elder
Wagner Prelude and Good Friday Music from Parsifal (c.20 mins)
‘I may not be a first-rate composer,’ quipped Richard Strauss, ‘but I am a first-class second-rate composer.’ No one could accuse Strauss of modesty and in this expansive love-letter to, well, himself, he uses huge orchestral forces and a dash of humour to catalogue his ‘heroic’ struggle. Sir Mark Elder (and leader Laura Samuel) will bring out all the swagger and glory of this magnificent music as well as its tenderness and grace. Strauss’s great idol was Mozart so it’s only right that Sophie Bevan joins us for one of his most dramatic concert arias and, to prove that heroes come in all forms, we open with the mysterious Prelude and radiant Good Friday music from Wagner’s tale of a ‘holy fool’ made wise through compassion.
Mozart Concert aria: Ah, lo previdi, K.272* (c.15 mins)
R Strauss Ein Heldenleben (A Hero’s Life) (c.45 mins)
Sophie Bevan soprano* Mark Elder conductor
Images/Adam Walker and Marin Alsop
Thursday 21.04.2022 7.30pm
Marin Alsop Conducts Dvořák
James MacMillan The Confession of Isobel Gowdie
Following her acclaimed appearances with the BBC SSO at the 2021 Edinburgh International Festival, Marin Alsop returns with a programme steeped in folk traditions. Sir James MacMillan’s depiction of persecution and redemption in 17th century Scotland has become a modern classic since the BBC SSO gave the premiere in 1990. Christopher Rouse’s elegiac Flute Concerto, meanwhile, is also influenced by traditional Celtic music and was hailed as ‘a masterpiece’ by The Herald. Adam Walker is the soloist. And when 19th century Czech listeners first experienced Dvořák’s Seventh they recognised the music of their homeland and heard it as a drama of national reawakening – but you don’t need Bohemian blood to be swept along by its passion and glorious melodies.
(c.26 mins)
Rouse Flute Concerto (c.28 mins) Dvořák Symphony No.7 (c.40 mins) Adam Walker flute Marin Alsop conductor
Thursday 12.05.2022 7.30pm Bartók The Wooden Prince (c.48 mins) Nielsen Symphony No.2 ‘The Four Temperaments’ (c.32 mins)
Thomas Dausgaard conductor
Dausgaard Conducts Nielsen Symphony No.2 A handsome prince, a beautiful princess, and a well-meaning fairy: it’s the stuff of children’s stories. But this is a fairy-tale with claws, and there are some startling surprises in store as we venture into the flamboyantly colourful world of Bartók’s 1914/17 ballet The Wooden Prince – Hungary’s answer to The Firebird. Then enjoy Carl Nielsen’s quirky Second Symphony (a musical depiction of human personality ‘types’ according to the Ancient Greeks) in the first of three concerts that bring our Nielsen cycle with Chief Conductor Thomas Dausgaard to completion.
Images/Jörg Widmann and Abel Selaocoe
Sunday 15.05.2022 3.00pm Various Works (c.45 mins) including Giovanni Sollima L.B. Files Nielsen Symphony No.5 (c.37 mins) Abel Selaocoe cello Thomas Dausgaard conductor
Abel Selaocoe & Nielsen Symphony No.5 There is no performer in the world right now quite like the cellist Abel Selaocoe. His extraordinary performances fuse African and European music and blend traditional playing styles with improvisation, singing and body percussion. He’s the centre of this concert’s first half, collaborating with the orchestra and Thomas Dausgaard to explore a free-flowing selection of music which includes Abel’s own compositions and cello virtuoso Giovanni Sollima’s homage to Boccherini, the L.B. Files. After the interval, our Nielsen cycle continues with the grippingly powerful Fifth Symphony, a work that’s among the great anti-war testaments of the 20th century. Join us for what’s bound to be an unforgettable afternoon.
Closing Night Thursday 19.05.2022 7.30pm
Dausgaard Conducts Nielsen Symphonies 1 & 4
Nielsen Symphony No.1 (c.35mins)
‘Music is the sound of life,’ said Nielsen. Nowhere is this truer than in his elemental Fourth Symphony, written during the First World War, as it pulses and surges with a headstrong determination, from its turbulent opening to the famous ‘duel’ for timpanists at its close. It’s a breathless, exciting climax to our Nielsen cycle and our 21/22 Season. Thomas Dausgaard, in his last Glasgow appearance as Chief Conductor, precedes it with the fleet-footed First Symphony, written when the composer was just 27 and Mozart’s evergreen Clarinet Concerto with our Artist in Residence, Jörg Widmann, as soloist.
Mozart Clarinet Concerto (c.25 mins) Nielsen Symphony No.4 ‘The Inextinguishable’ (c.32 mins) Jörg Widmann clarinet Thomas Dausgaard conductor
Please note: this concert will have two intervals of 15 mins.
Afternoon Performances
Jörg Widmann by Marco Borggreve, Yeol Eum Son by Jaehyong Park, Joana Carneiro by Alan Peebles, Ben Hulett by Helena Cooke, Ilan Volkov by Astrid Ackermann, Ryan Wigglesworth by Benjamin Ealovega
Thursday 27.01.2022 2.00pm
Mozart, Weber & Widmann Afternoon concerts return to City Halls and the
Mozart first is spearheaded by our Artist in Residence, Divertimento K.136 (125a) (c.15 mins) Weber Clarinet Quintet – chamber orchestra version* (c.28 mins) Jörg Widmann Fantasie for solo clarinet* (c.7 mins) Jörg Widmann Free Pieces for chamber orchestra (c.25 mins)
Jörg Widmann clarinet*/director
Jörg Widmann. Anyone who saw him with us in October 2021 will recall his extraordinary energy and dynamism, and once again he’s playing and conducting. The BBC SSO strings open with Mozart’s vivacious Divertimento (one of his so-called ‘Salzburg Symphonies’) before boosting the numbers in a performance of Weber’s bubbling quintet. Written when he was just 20, Widmann’s Fantasie demands mind-boggling technical skill and combines Romantic lyricism with touches of dance, klezmer and jazz. And to close, he directs the orchestra in a work that links a series of 10 short movements, each of which is inspired by a different type of sound phenomenon.
Thursday 17.02.2022 2.00pm
Stravinsky’s ‘Petrushka’
Brimming with Russian folk tunes, Stravinsky’s 1911 ballet tells the story of the lovestruck puppet Petrushka through a brilliant use of orchestral colour and infectious rhythm. Over a century later, Esa-Pekka Salonen its sense of mischief and pathos never seems to Piano Concerto (c.33 mins) dim. Joana Carneiro conducts, opening with Anna Stravinsky Clyne’s «rewind« which mimics ‘a video tape rapidly Petrushka (1947 version) (c.35 mins) scrolling backwards’ to astonishing effect, and the Piano Concerto by the Finnish conductor/composer Yeol Eum Son piano Esa-Pekka Salonen. It fuses French Baroque, science Joana Carneiro conductor fiction, birdsong, jazz, and the great Romantic concertos into something unforgettable, so fasten your seatbelts as acclaimed pianist Yeol Eum Son takes us on an epic, breathtaking ride.
Anna Clyne «rewind« (c.7 mins)
Thursday 17.03.2022 2.00pm Rameau Naïs: orchestral suite (c.25 mins) Maderna Venetian Journal* (c.20 mins) Frescobaldi (transc. Maderna) Tre Pezzi (c.11 mins) Haydn Symphony No.82 ‘The Bear’ (c.32 mins)
Benjamin Hulett tenor* Ilan Volkov conductor
Thursday 05.05.2022 2.00pm Jörg Widmann New Work BBC Commission, World Premiere (c.10 mins)
Mozart Piano Concerto No.12, K.414 (c.23 mins)
Sibelius Symphony No.4 (c.39 mins)
Volkov in Venice In 1765, a young James Boswell visited Venice and wasn’t impressed. He complained of ‘travelling continually by water, shut up in those lugubrious gondolas’. Over 200 years later, Bruno Maderna used the Scotsman’s visit to his home city to create a mash-up of 18th and 20th-century musical styles, to often very funny effect. Boswell made little record of the music he heard on his grand tour but our Principal Guest Conductor Ilan Volkov offers some suggestions: Frescobaldi, who had already left his mark on the Italian style, Rameau’s opera about a nymph seduced by Neptune and, surely, Haydn, whose joyous Symphony No.82 is thought to imitate the drone of bagpipes in its last movement.
Sibelius & Mozart Sibelius’s Fourth Symphony is perhaps the composer’s most enigmatic. From its brooding opening it moves like a great sea creature in the depths, mysterious, powerful, and only occasionally rising towards the light. It’s also thought by many to be the composer’s greatest work. Ryan Wigglesworth is sure to bring out all its richness and intensity after he takes to the keyboard as the soloist in Mozart’s elegant early Piano Concerto. And to set things off with a flourish, a World Premiere of a new work from our Artist in Residence and a major voice in contemporary composition, Jörg Widmann.
Ryan Wigglesworth piano/director
Afternoon Performance Tickets £13.00 if bought in advance. £16.00 if bought on the day of performance.
£6.00 tickets for students, Under 26s and Registered Unemployed (proof of status required). Unreserved Seating. Booking fees may apply.
Wednesday 09.02.2022 7.30pm
BBC SSO & RSNO Adams and Shostakovich Glasgow Royal Concert Hall
Samy Moussa Elysium
María Dueñas violin Kevin John Edusei conductor
Orchestras assemble! Join the RSNO and BBC SSO as we combine forces to mark the 2022 Association of British Orchestras Conference in Glasgow. María Dueñas is the youthful soloist in Shostakovich’s Soviet thriller of a Violin Concerto and there’s a UK Premiere, too, from Canadian composer Samy Moussa. Then get ready for blast-off as our double-orchestra brings John Adams’s high-octane masterpiece to vivid life, inspired by his dream of an oil tanker sailing into the San Francisco sky.
Members of the BBC Scottish Symphony and Royal Scottish National Orchestras
This concert is presented in association with the Association of British Orchestras and the Royal Scottish National Orchestra. It will be broadcast live on BBC Radio 3 and BBC Sounds.
BBC Co-commission, UK Premiere (c.12 mins)
Shostakovich Violin Concerto No.1 (c.40 mins) John Adams Harmonielehre (c.40 mins)
María Dueñas by Tam Lan Truong, Kevin John Edusei by Marco Borggreve
Book Online and Save up to 35% this Spring at
bbc.co.uk/ssosubscriptions
Book between 4 and 13 concerts for our Spring Season and you can save up to 35%. Seniors are entitled to an extra 5% off. If you find that you can’t attend a concert you’ve booked in advance we’ll happily swap it for another BBC SSO concert. Please note that the Box Office requires 24 hours’ notice. Packages Booking Opens 10am Thursday 25 November 2021 General Booking Opens 10am Thursday 2 December 2021 £6 tickets for Under 26s, Students and Unemployed Under 26s, Students (those in full-time education), and Registered Unemployed are entitled to a £6 ticket for themselves (subject to availability). Proof of status is required.
50% Discount for Registered Disabled Disabled patrons, and a carer where required, will receive a 50% discount on any single full price ticket. Venue Box Office Charges Please note that the Glasgow Life Box Office charges a fee of £1.50 on all online bookings. E-Tickets This season we will only be using e-tickets which will be e-mailed to you. Please ensure you have printed off your e-ticket or can display it on your mobile phone for front of house staff. Box Office: 0141 353 8000 Monday to Saturday, 10am–5pm only Chief Conductor Thomas Dausgaard with the BBC SSO at City Halls by Sim Canetty-Clarke
Book Online at bbc.co.uk/bbcsso glasgowconcerthalls.com II I ny lco Ba IV
s& all St
s ce rra Te
Single Ticket Prices IV
IV I II
III
Ba lco ny
III
III
St all s&
IV
Te rra ce s
Area I: £28.50 Area II: £23.50 Area III: £19.50 Area IV: £14.50 (venue booking fees may apply)
Stage
Spring 2022 Subscription Package Prices Seating Area
% Save
I £102.60
4 concerts
10
Standard
15
Concession £96.92
5 concerts
15
Standard
II
III
IV
£84.60
£70.20
£52.20
£79.92
£66.32
£49.32
£121.15
£99.90
£82.90
£61.65
20
Concession £114.00
£94.00
£78.00
£58.00
6 concerts
15
Standard
£119.88
£99.48
£73.98
20
Concession £136.80 £112.80 £93.60
£145.38
£69.60
7 concerts
20
Standard
£159.60
£131.60
£109.20
£81.20
25
Concession £149.66
£123.41
£102.41
£76.16
8 concerts
20
Standard
£182.40
£150.40
£124.80
£92.80
25
Concession £171.04
£141.04
£117.04
£87.04
9 concerts
25
Standard
£192.42
£158.67
£131.67
£97.92
30
Concession £179.55
£148.05
£122.85
£91.35
10 concerts
25
Standard
£213.80
£176.30
£146.30
£108.80
30
Concession £199.50
£164.50
£136.50
£101.50
11 concerts
30
Standard
£219.45
£180.95
£150.15
£111.65
35
Concession £203.83
£168.08
£139.48
£103.73
12 concerts
30
Standard
£197.40
£163.80
£121.80
35
Concession £222.36
£183.36
£152.16
£113.16
£239.40
13 concerts
35
Standard
£240.89
£198.64
£164.84
£122.59
40
Concession £222.30
£183.30
£152.10
£113.10
BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra
Stay connected
BBC Scotland City Halls, Candleriggs Glasgow G1 1NQ Email: bbcsso@bbc.co.uk bbc.co.uk/bbcsso
facebook.com/bbcsso
The majority of listed concerts will be recorded for future broadcast by BBC Radio 3. After broadcast, concerts will be available for 30 days via BBC Sounds, where you can also discover a world of amazing music, radio and podcasts from the BBC by downloading the free app.
twitter.com/bbcsso youtube.com/bbcsso instagram.com/bbcsso
The information in this brochure was correct at the time of publishing. The BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra reserves the right to amend artists and programmes for any of the listed concerts if necessary.