LPO concert programme: 19 Oct 2022 - Canellakis conducts Brahms (Karina Canellakis/Emanuel Ax)

Where music takes you

Concert programme

Principal Conductor

Gardner supported by Aud Jebsen

Guest Conductor Karina Canellakis

Emeritus Vladimir Jurowski Patron

The Duke of Kent

Director Elena Dubinets Chief Executive David Burke

Pieter Schoeman

by

Westreich

Canellakis conducts Brahms

Dvořák

Wild Dove

Dean

Memorials (21’)

(20’)

Concerto No. 1 in D minor, Op. 15 (42’)

Karina Canellakis

Ax piano

supported by Cockayne – Grants for the Arts

The London Community Foundation.

Welcome LPO news

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New on the LPO Label

Last month saw our release of Tippett’s The Midsummer Marriage on the LPO Label –the first commercial recording of the opera in over 50 years. It was recorded live at the Royal Festival Hall on the opening night of the LPO’s 2021/22 season, which also marked Edward Gardner’s first concert as Principal Conductor. The cast includes Robert Murray, Rachel Nicholls, Ashley Riches, Jennifer France, Toby Spence, the London Philharmonic Choir and the English National Opera Chorus. As well as being available to stream or download on all the major platforms, the release is also available from all good retailers as a premium three-CD box set.

LPO Conducting Fellowship

We’re delighted to invite applications to our new LPO Conducting Fellowship for the 2023/24 season. This flagship programme offers a unique opportunity to two outstanding early-career conductors from backgrounds currently under-represented in conductors of professional orchestras.

We believe that talent is indiscriminate, yet people from certain backgrounds and communities continue to be under-represented in the orchestral sector. The Fellowship aims to promote diversity and inclusivity in classical music as a whole, to lead eventually to a sector more reflective of the wider population. We invite applications from conductors from historically underrepresented communities in terms of gender identity, race, socio-economic background, neurodiversity, disability or other under-represented groups.

Guided by the LPO’s Principal Conductor, Edward Gardner, Fellow Conductors will become fully immersed in the life of the Orchestra, developing skills and knowledge, and broadening their professional network. They will be invited to attend rehearsals and concerts, and will be offered conducting opportunities with the LPO and its rising talent ensembles.

The deadline to apply is 9am this Friday, 21 October 2022. For more information visit www.lpo.org.uk/lpo-conducting-fellowship.html

Supported by the Michael Tippett Musical Foundation in memory of Dennis Marks

First Violins

Pieter Schoeman* Leader Chair supported by Neil Westreich Alice Ivy-Pemberton Lasma Taimina Chair supported by Irina Gofman & Mr Rodrik V. G. Cave Minn Majoe

Katalin Varnagy Chair supported by Sonja Drexler Alice Apreda Howell Cassi Hamilton Yang Zhang Chair supported by Eric Tomsett Fanny Fheodoroff Martin Höhmann Catherine Craig Nilufar Alimaksumova Alice Hall Ronald Long Kay Chappell Gabriela Opacka

Second Violins

Tania Mazzetti Principal Chair supported by Countess Dominique Loredan Emma Oldfield Co-Principal Helena Smart Kate Birchall Joseph Maher Nancy Elan Fiona Higham Chair supported by David & Yi Buckley Claudia Tarrant-Matthews Sioni Williams Sarah Thornett Sheila Law Lyrit Milgram Jamie Hutchinson Charlie MacClure

Violas

Richard Waters Principal Chair supported by Caroline, Jamie & Zander Sharp Raquel López Bolívar Benedetto Pollani

Stanislav Popov Martin Wray Kate De Campos Laura Vallejo

On stage tonight

Toby Warr

Katharine Leek Pamela Ferriman Julia Doukakis Anita Kurowska

Cellos

Kristina Blaumane Principal Chair supported by Bianca & Stuart Roden Pei-Jee Ng Co-Principal Chair supported by The Candide Trust Francis Bucknall Sue Sutherley Leo Melvin Helen Thomas George Hoult Iain Ward Auriol Evans Hee Yeon Cho

Double Basses

Sebastian Pennar Principal Hugh Kluger George Peniston Laura Murphy Charlotte Kerbegian Adam Wynter Sam Rice Gabriel Rodrigues

Flutes

Juliette Bausor Principal Camilla Marchant Ian Mullin Katherine Bicknell

Piccolos

Katherine Bicknell Ian Mullin Camilla Marchant

Oboes

Ian Hardwick* Principal Alice Munday Emily Stephens Sue Böhling*

Cor Anglais

Sue Böhling* Principal Chair supported by Dr Barry Grimaldi

Clarinets

Benjamin Mellefont

Principal Thomas Watmough Chair supported by Roger Greenwood James Maltby Paul Richards*

E-flat Clarinet Thomas Watmough Principal Chair supported by Roger Greenwood Bass Clarinets Paul Richards* Principal James Maltby

Bassoons

Jonathan Davies Principal Chair supported by Sir Simon Robey Dominic Tyler Simon Estell*

Contrabassoon Simon Estell* Principal Horns

John Ryan* Principal Annemarie Federle Guest Principal Martin Hobbs Mark Vines Co-Principal Gareth Mollison Jason Koczur

Trumpets

Paul Beniston* Principal Holly Clark Guest Principal Anne McAneney* David Hilton

Piccolo Trumpet Paul Beniston*

Bass Trumpet

David Whitehouse

Trombones

Mark Templeton* Principal Chair supported by William & Alex de Winton David Whitehouse

Bass Trombone

Lyndon Meredith Principal

Tuba

Lee Tsarmaklis* Principal Chair supported by Friends of the Orchestra

Timpani

Simon Carrington* Principal Chair supported by Victoria Robey OBE

Percussion

Andrew Barclay* Principal Chair supported by Garf & Gill Collins Keith Millar Oliver Yates Laura Bradford Richard Horne Sarah Mason Karen Hutt

Harps

Rachel Masters Principal Tamara Young

Piano

Philip Moore

Celeste/Harmonium Catherine Edwards

Assistant Conductor John Warner

* Holds a professorial appointment in London

London Philharmonic Orchestra

Uniquely groundbreaking and exhilarating to watch and hear, the London Philharmonic Orchestra has been celebrated as one of the world’s great orchestras since Sir Thomas Beecham founded it in 1932. With every performance we aim to bring wonder to the modern world and cement our position as a leading orchestra for the 21st century.

Our home is here at the Southbank’s Royal Festival Hall, where we’re at the beating heart of London’s cultural life. You’ll also find us at our resident venues in Brighton, Eastbourne and Saffron Walden, and on tour throughout the UK and internationally, performing to sell-out audiences worldwide. Each summer we’re resident at Glyndebourne Festival Opera, combining the magic of opera with Glyndebourne’s glorious setting in the Sussex countryside.

Sharing the wonder

We’re always at the forefront of technology, finding new ways to share our music globally. You’ll find us online, on streaming platforms, on social media and through our broadcast partnership with Marquee TV. During the pandemic period we launched ‘LPOnline’: over 100 videos of performances, insights and introductions to playlists, which led to us being named runner-up in the Digital Classical Music Awards 2020. During 2022/23 we’ll be working once again with Marquee TV to broadcast selected live concerts, so you can share or relive the wonder from your own living room.

Our conductors

Our Principal Conductors have included some of the greatest historic names like Sir Adrian Boult, Bernard Haitink, Sir Georg Solti, Klaus Tennstedt and Kurt Masur. In 2021 Edward Gardner became our 13th Principal Conductor, taking the Orchestra into its tenth decade. Vladimir Jurowski became Conductor Emeritus in recognition of his impact as Principal Conductor from 2007–21. Karina Canellakis is our current Principal Guest Conductor and Brett Dean our Composer-in-Residence.

Soundtrack to key moments

Everyone will have heard the London Philharmonic Orchestra, whether it’s playing the world’s National Anthems at every medal ceremony of the London 2012 Olympics and Paralympics, our iconic recording with Pavarotti that made Nessun Dorma a global football anthem, or closing the flotilla at The Queen’s Thames Diamond Jubilee Pageant. And you’ll almost certainly have heard us on the soundtracks for major films including The Lord of the Rings

We also release live, studio and archive recordings on our own label, and are the world’s most-streamed orchestra, with over 15 million plays of our content each month. Recent releases include music by Richard Strauss under Klaus Tennstedt with legendary soprano Jessye Norman; the first volume of a Stravinsky series with Vladimir Jurowski including The Rite of Spring

© Mark Allan

Pieter Schoeman Leader

and The Firebird; and Tippett’s complete opera

The Midsummer Marriage under Edward Gardner, captured in his first concert as LPO Principal Conductor in September 2021 (see page 2).

Next generations

We’re committed to inspiring the next generation of musicians and music-lovers: there’s nothing we love more than seeing the joy of children and families enjoying their first musical moments, and we’re passionate about equipping schools and teachers through schools’ concerts, resources and training. Reflecting our values of collaboration and inclusivity, our OrchLab and Open Sound Ensemble projects offer music-making opportunities for adults and young people with special educational needs and disabilities. Today’s young instrumentalists are the orchestral members of the future, so we’re committed to offering them opportunities to progress. Our LPO Junior Artists programme is leading the way in creating pathways into the profession for young artists from under-represented communities, and our LPO Young Composers and Foyle Future Firsts schemes support the next generation of professional musicians, bridging the transition from education to professional careers.

2022/23 and beyond

We believe in the relevance of our music, and that our programmes must reflect the narratives of modern times. This season we’re exploring themes of belonging and displacement in our series ‘A place to call home’, delving into music by composers including Austrians Erich Korngold and Paul Hindemith, Hungarian Béla Bartók, Cuban Tania León, Ukrainian Victoria Vita Polevá and Syrian Kinan Azmeh. As we celebrate our 90th anniversary we perform works premiered by the Orchestra during its illustrious history. This season also marks Vaughan Williams’s 150th anniversary and we’ll be celebrating with four of his works, as well as both symphonies by Elgar and music by Tippett and Thomas Adès. Our commitment to everything new and creative includes premieres by Brett Dean, Mark Simpson and Heiner Goebbels, as well as new commissions from composers from around the world including Agata Zubel, Elena Langer and Vijay Iyer.

Pieter Schoeman was appointed Leader of the London Philharmonic Orchestra in 2008, having previously been Co-Leader since 2002. He is also a Professor of Violin at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music & Dance.

Pieter has performed worldwide as a soloist and recitalist in such famous halls as the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Moscow’s Rachmaninov Hall, Capella Hall in St Petersburg, Staatsbibliothek in Berlin, Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles and London’s Royal Festival Hall. As a chamber musician he regularly appears at London’s prestigious Wigmore Hall. His chamber music partners have included Anne-Sophie Mutter, Veronika Eberle, Patricia Kopatchinskaja, Boris Garlitsky, Jean-Guihen Queyras, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Martin Helmchen and Julia Fischer.

Pieter has performed numerous times as a soloist with the London Philharmonic Orchestra. Highlights have included an appearance as both conductor and soloist in Vivaldi’s Four Seasons at the Royal Festival Hall, the Brahms Double Concerto with Kristina Blaumane, and the Britten Double Concerto with Alexander Zemtsov, which was recorded and released on the LPO Label to great critical acclaim.

Pieter has appeared as Guest Leader with the BBC, Barcelona, Bordeaux, Lyon and Baltimore symphony orchestras; the Rotterdam and BBC Philharmonic orchestras; and the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra.

Pieter’s chair in the LPO is generously supported by Neil Westreich.

© Benjamin Ealovega

Karina Canellakis

Principal Guest Conductor, London Philharmonic Orchestra

Internationally acclaimed for her emotionally charged performances, technical command and interpretive depth, Karina Canellakis has become one of the most in-demand conductors of her generation. She became the London Philharmonic Orchestra’s Principal Guest Conductor in September 2020, and her performances with the Orchestra in her first season led to one critic recounting the ‘explosive chemistry between this conductor and orchestra’, while another described ‘a musical partnership that looks set to be one of the most exciting and rewarding in London’. Karina is also Chief Conductor of the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra, and Principal Guest Conductor of the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin (RSB).

In the 2022/23 season Karina is looking forward to exciting debuts with the New York Philharmonic, National Symphony Orchestra and Pittsburgh Symphony. After starting her season at the BBC Proms, she also returns to the Orchestre de Paris, the Boston and Dallas symphony orchestras, The Philadelphia Orchestra and the San Francisco Symphony, as well as the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra.

As Principal Guest Conductor of the London Philharmonic Orchestra, she will be be joined this season by pianist Daniil Trifonov and violinist Augustin Hadelich for concertos by Prokofiev and Sibelius, as well as pouring her energy and insight into Beethoven’s ‘Eroica’ Symphony and Tchaikovsky’s Fifth. Next March she will embark on an extensive tour of Germany’s most prestigious concert halls with the Orchestra and soloist Daniil Trifonov. She also returns to Berlin for concerts in her position as Principal Guest Conductor of the RSB. Karina continues to present exciting modern pieces as well as well-known masterpieces at the Concertgebouw

Amsterdam and TivoliVredenburg in Utrecht with the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra, where she holds the title of Chief Conductor. After the great success of Kat’a Kabánova last season, she brings another Janáček opera, The Cunning Little Vixen, to the stage of the Concertgebouw in April 2023. On the opera stage she has also conducted critically acclaimed productions of Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin; Mozart’s Don Giovanni, Die Zauberflöte and Le nozze di Figaro; David Lang’s the loser; and Peter Maxwell Davies’s The Hogboon

Since winning the Sir Georg Solti Conducting Award in 2016, Karina has become a guest conductor with leading orchestras around the world including the London Symphony Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra, Chicago Symphony, Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra, Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal, Munich Philharmonic, and the symphony orchestras of Melbourne, Sydney, Toronto, Cincinnati, Minnesota, Detroit and Vienna. She was the first woman to conduct the First Night of the BBC Proms in London in 2019, with the BBC Symphony Orchestra. She was also the first woman to ever conduct the Nobel Prize Concert with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic in 2018.

Already known to many in the classical music world for her virtuoso violin playing, Karina was initially encouraged to pursue conducting by Sir Simon Rattle while she was playing regularly in the Berlin Philharmonic for two years as a member of its Orchester-Akademie. She performed for many years as a soloist, guest leader and chamber musician, spending her summers at the Marlboro Music Festival, until conducting eventually became her focus. Karina was born and raised in New York City.

© Mathias

Bothor

Emanuel Ax piano

Born to Polish parents in what is today the Ukrainian city of Lviv, Emanuel Ax moved to Winnipeg, Canada, with his family when he was a young boy. He made his New York debut in the Young Concert Artists Series, and in 1974 won the first Arthur Rubinstein International Piano Competition in Tel Aviv. In 1975 he won the Michaels Award of Young Concert Artists, followed four years later by the Avery Fisher Prize.

In autumn 2021 Ax resumed a post-COVID touring schedule that included concerts with the Colorado, Pacific, Cincinnati and Houston symphonies, as well as the Minnesota, Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia and Cleveland orchestras. 2022/23 includes a tour with Itzhak Perlman and Friends, and a continuation of the ‘Beethoven For 3’ touring and recording project with violinist Leonidas Kavakos and cellist Yo-Yo Ma, this year on the West Coast. In recital he can be heard in Palm Beach, Los Angeles, St Louis, Chicago, Washington DC, Houston, Las Vegas and New York, and with orchestras in Atlanta, Detroit, Boston, San Francisco, San Diego, New York, Naples, Portland, Toronto, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and Cleveland. European tours this autumn and and in spring 2023 include concerts in the UK, Germany, Switzerland and France.

Emanuel Ax has been a Sony Classical exclusive recording artist since 1987 and, following the success of the Brahms Trios with Kavakos and Ma, the trio launched an ambitious, multi-year project to record all the Beethoven Trios and Symphonies arranged for trio, the first two discs of which have recently been released. He has received Grammy Awards for the second and third volumes of his cycle of Haydn’s piano sonatas. He has also made a series of Grammy-winning

recordings with Yo-Yo Ma of the Beethoven and Brahms sonatas for cello and piano. In the 2004/05 season he contributed to an International Emmy Award-Winning BBC documentary commemorating the Holocaust, which aired on the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. In 2013 his recording ‘Variations’ received the Echo Klassik Award for Solo Recording of the Year (19th-century Music/Piano).

Emanuel Ax is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and holds honorary doctorates of music from Skidmore College, New England Conservatory of Music, Yale University and Columbia University.

© Lisa Marie Mazzucco

Programme notes

Antonín Dvořák

The Wild Dove, Op. 110

For most of his mature career Antonín Dvořák managed to sustain a skilful artistic tightrope act. The music of his Bohemian (today Czech) homeland was precious to him, and he continually sought new ways of incorporating its flavoursome characteristics into his own style: up to a point he could be described as a nationalist. But unlike the really hard-line nationalists of his day he also venerated the great German classicromantic Johannes Brahms; and like his hero, and enthusiastic supporter, Dvořák concentrated a lot of his attention on the established ‘classical’ forms: symphonies, string quartets, conventional religious choral works and two magnificent concertos. If the nationalists would regard all this with suspicion, so too would the modernists – the followers of Richard Wagner and Franz Liszt. For these selfstyled ‘progressives’, writing in classical forms was a hopelessly moribund way of thinking: there could be no such thing as ‘absolute’ or ‘abstract’ composition; music only functioned at the height of its powers when it was reunited with other arts – as, for instance, in the Lisztian ‘symphonic poem’, where music was contrived to illustrate stories, paint scenes, or even convey philosophical ideas.

So when, in 1896, Dvořák suddenly produced a flood of symphonic poems, there was astonishment in some quarters. What on earth was Brahms’s most famous protégé doing writing things like these? Could the fact that Brahms was now mortally ill have been influential –with his father-figure effectively leaving the stage, did Dvořák now feel free to explore new fields? Or was it the effect of his triumphant American sojourn, and the hero’s welcome he received on his return to Europe in 1895? Whatever, the enthusiasm and delight with which Dvořák approached the medium is audible in all four of these works. Dvořák had in fact produced three semiprogrammatic ‘overtures’ already under the heading ‘Nature, Life and Love’ back in 1892. But in these new, openly symphonic-poetic works the element of musical storytelling acquires a new richness and vitality.

The Wild Dove (or ‘Wood Dove’) – one of four substantial symphonic poems Dvořák produced in 1896 – is a prime example, transforming its dark story into a haunting, atmospheric musical drama. The Wild Dove is based on a ballad by the influential Czech folklorist Karel Jaromír Erben. In the ballad, a young woman poisons her husband, putting on a spectacular display of grief at his funeral. She then falls for a handsome young man, to whom she’s soon married with plenty of ostentatious celebration. But the eerie, plaintive cooing of a dove stirs her guilty conscience, and eventually, in a fit of remorse, she kills herself.

Dvořák’s musical retelling begins with funeral music (sombre, martial brass and timpani with lamenting melodies for flutes and violins), in which the feigned sobs of the widow can also be heard (again flutes and violins, in weird chromatic falling figures). The comely youth appears (distant trumpets, woodwind and harp, with a sinister colouring provided by bass clarinet), while the dove’s song hovers, as yet unheeded, on flute. Wild wedding festivities follow, eventually subsiding into gentler, more intimate dance music. However, hushed string tremolos introduce the chilling dove-call (flutes, oboe and fluttering high harp), and anguished crescendos illustrate the widow’s pangs of guilt and eventual self-destruction. But unlike the poet Erben, Dvořák doesn’t stop there: an elegiac string coda is followed by hymn-like woodwind chords, and finally a widely spaced major-key chord on strings suggests atonement and benediction, with the dove’s call now sounding calmly on flutes and harp. Is the dove the voice of the murdered husband, or simply natural justice? Either way, it seems to have been appeased.

One other point of interest: The Wild Dove had its first performance in 1898 in Brno, under the baton of a then little-known composer named Leoš Janáček.

Stephen Johnson

Programme notes

Brett Dean born 1961

Three Memorials

Dispersal (2001)

Ceremonial (2003)

Komarov’s

A composer profile is on the next page.

Three Memorials is made up of three sombre yet dramatic works which were originally commissioned as single, stand-alone movements: Dispersal for the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra’s ‘Federation Fanfare’ series in 2001 and the BBC Symphony’s Australian tour in 2002; Ceremonial for the 75th anniversary of the West Australian Symphony in 2003; and Komarov’s Fall for the Berlin Philharmonic’s ‘Ad Astra’ project in 2006. As a set of three pieces it was first performed in Cardiff by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales under André de Ridder as part of the 2009 Vale of Glamorgan Festival. Each piece is scored for a similarly large orchestra and, as the grouped title indicates, is written in memory, either of an individual or of groups of people against whom violent acts and injustices have been perpetrated across three different centuries.

‘Dispersal’, in colonial Australian parlance, was a widely used euphemism for the pursuit and slaughter of indigenous Australians. Specifically the work pays homage to the victims of a massacre at Murdering Creek in Queensland in the 1860s. The quotation on distant harmonium at the end is of Parry’s hymn tune ‘Intercessor’ which traditionally accompanies the American poem ‘O brother man, fold to thy heart thy brother’.

(2006)

Ceremonial was conceived as memorial music in the aftermath of the Bali bombing by Islamist terrorists in October 2002. The prominent role accorded to tuned percussion, particularly gongs, pays musical homage to the moving traditional ceremonies held on Bali following that tragedy which claimed the lives of over 200 people, including 88 Australians.

Komarov’s Fall memorialises Vladimir Mikhailovich Komarov, the first person to die in space aboard the ill-fated Soyuz 1, a project plagued by serious problems but whose launch in April 1964 took place nevertheless in order to coincide with Lenin’s birthday. The work starts with the eerie vastness one senses from listening to space telemetry signals, however it was the chance finding of an archival recording of Komarov’s last frantic radio transmissions with ground control that informed the jagged urgency of the ensuing music. A brief lyrical section in the middle of the work was inspired by the final words shared between Komarov and his wife Valentina. On the Soyuz’s final orbit, she was invited into the control centre to bid farewell, so certain were all concerned of the impending doom.

Interval – 20 minutes

Brett Dean

Composer-in-Residence, London Philharmonic Orchestra

LPO partnership

Australian composer Brett Dean became the LPO’s Composer-in-Residence for three years from September 2020. The Orchestra worked closely with Dean on his opera Hamlet, which was premiered at Glyndebourne Festival Opera in 2017 to great acclaim, winning both the 2018 South Bank Sky Arts Award and the International Opera Award for Best New Opera. During his LPO residency he also takes on the role of Composer Mentor to the LPO Young Composers Programme, providing guidance and expertise to the five rising stars and conducting their annual Debut Sounds showcase.

In December 2020 the LPO and Vladimir Jurowski gave the UK premiere of Dean’s The Players for orchestra and accordion, filmed at the Royal Festival Hall, broadcast and still available to watch on Marquee TV. On 9 February 2022 the Orchestra performed Dean’s Viola Concerto with soloist Lawrence Power. The 2022/23 season with the LPO sees a performance of his Amphitheatre (18 January 2023) and the world premiere of In spe contra spem under Edward Gardner, with soloists Emma Bell and Elsa Dreisig (26 April 2023).

Background and music

Brett Dean began composing in 1988, initially concentrating on experimental film and radio projects and as an improvising performer. His reputation as a composer continued to develop, and it was through works such as his clarinet concerto Ariel’s Music (1995), which won an award from the UNESCO International Rostrum of Composers, and Carlo (1997) for strings, sampler and tape, inspired by the music of Carlo Gesualdo, that he gained international recognition.

Dean enjoys a busy performing career as violist and conductor, performing his own Viola Concerto with the world’s leading orchestras. He is a natural chamber musician, frequently collaborating with other soloists and ensembles to perform both his own chamber works and standard repertoire. Dean’s imaginative conducting programmes usually centre around his own works combined with other composers: highlights include his appointment as Creative Chair at the TonhalleOrchester Zürich 2017/18; projects with the BBC Symphony, BBC Philharmonic, Berlin Philharmonic, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Melbourne Symphony, Sydney Symphony, Gothenburg Symphony, Toronto Symphony, Concertgebouw Orchestra, Orchestre National de Lyon and Tonkünstler-Orchester; and as Artist-in-Residence with the Swedish Chamber Orchestra.

2022/23 season

Last month saw the world premiere of In this Brief Moment for double chorus and orchestra, performed at Birmingham’s Symphony Hall by the CBSO & Chorus under Nicholas Collon; the work was commissioned by the Orchestre National de Lyon, Sydney Philharmonia Choirs and the CBSO. Later this season Dean conducts the Swedish Chamber Orchestra and soprano Jennifer France in two recorded concerts at Örebro Concert Hall, including performances of his own composition And once I played Ophelia. Further premieres this season include the Australian premiere of the piano concerto Gneixendorf Music; A Winter’s Journey with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra; the world premiere of a new work for the Bavarian State Orchestra; and the German premiere of In This Brief Moment with the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra. Dean’s critically acclaimed opera Hamlet will also return for a run of performances at the Bayerische Staatsoper in May 2023.

©

Programme notes

Johannes Brahms

Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor, Op.

Maestoso

Adagio

Rondo: Allegro non troppo

The D minor Piano Concerto is Brahms’s first orchestral work, composed in his early twenties. That it took him four years to complete is probably due partly to inexperience and partly to his uncertainty of mind during a traumatic period caused by the attempted suicide, mental illness and eventual death in 1856 of his friend and mentor Robert Schumann. Shortly after the first of these incidents, in 1854, Brahms began work on a sonata for two pianos, but soon started converting the piece to a four-movement symphony. Growing dissatisfaction with this version, however, led him to hit on the idea of combining both to form a piano concerto; the first movement was recast, but the others abandoned and new second and third movements composed in their place. The work was finished in 1858, and the premiere given early the following year in Hanover with Brahms as soloist.

If the first movement was born of a mixture of compromise and second thinking, it is not evident in the final result, unless it be in the fact that it displays a spectacular symphonic grandeur and expressive strength that had not been present in the concerto genre (nor even, in truth, in the symphony) since Beethoven, and that the piano part, though certainly taxing, is not principally driven by virtuosity as an end but plays a role effectively integrated with that of the orchestra. The grim Sturm und Drang passion of the movement as a whole, and of its opening theme in particular, may well owe something to the Schumann situation, but there are consoling moments, too, in this richly thematic sonata design, many of them memorably associated with the soloist, such as the

Bachian first entry and the richly chordal delivery of the second subject. This allows the most dramatic stroke of the movement to be the moment of recapitulation, when the piano for the first time takes up the turbulent opening theme, thundering it out over the same held Ds in the bass, but now cast into the disorientatingly darkening key of E major.

In his autograph score of the Adagio, Brahms wrote words from the Latin Mass under the calmly mystical opening: ‘Benedictus qui venit in nomine Domini’ (‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord’). He left no further explanation, and there has been speculation (not otherwise supported) that the theme was once intended for a Mass setting. Less equivocally, Brahms had been in the habit of addressing Schumann as ‘Domine’ and had privately told Schumann’s widow Clara that he was ‘painting a lovely portrait of you’, but whether connected to the Schumanns or not, this glorious music certainly appears moved by emotions as profound and heartfelt as those that inspired the first movement.

The symphonic drama of that first movement is not an easy force to summon again within the necessarily altered atmosphere of a finale, and Brahms’s choice of rondo form – in which a principal theme returns several times separated by contrasting episodes – is perhaps not the most obvious way to attempt it. Several commentators over the years have drawn attention to structural parallels between Brahms’s finale and that of Beethoven’s Third Piano Concerto – including the manner in which the main theme is presented, the

Programme notes

extravagant piano lead-backs and the central fugato episode – but the way the demonic energy of the opening movement is here successfully recalled while at the same time finding a lighter and more optimistic trajectory surely has a spiritual model in the finale of another great D minor piano concerto, Mozart’s K466.

Programme note © Lindsay Kemp

Recommended recordings of tonight’s works

by Laurie Watt

Dvořák: The Wild Dove Czech Philharmonic Orchestra | Jiří Bělohlávek (Chandos)

Brett Dean: Komarov’s Fall, from Three Memorials Hugh Wolff | Sydney Symphony Orchestra (BIS) or Simon Rattle | Berlin Philharmonic (EMI)

Brahms: Piano Concerto No. 1 Stephen Kovacevich | London Philharmonic Orchestra| Wolfgang Sawallisch (Warner

Sound Futures donors

We are grateful to the following donors for their generous contributions to our Sound Futures campaign. Thanks to their support, we successfully raised £1 million by 30 April 2015 which has now been matched pound for pound by Arts Council England through a Catalyst Endowment grant. This has enabled us to create a £2 million endowment fund supporting special artistic projects, creative programming and education work with key venue partners including our Southbank Centre home. Supporters listed below donated £500 or over. For a full list of those who have given to this campaign please visit lpo.org.uk/soundfutures

Masur Circle

Arts Council England Dunard Fund

Victoria Robey OBE Emmanuel & Barrie Roman The Underwood Trust

Welser-Möst Circle

William & Alex de Winton John Ireland Charitable Trust The Tsukanov Family Foundation Neil Westreich

Tennstedt Circle

Valentina & Dmitry Aksenov Richard Buxton

The Candide Trust Michael & Elena Kroupeev Kirby Laing Foundation

Mr & Mrs Makharinsky Alexey & Anastasia Reznikovich Sir Simon Robey Bianca & Stuart Roden Simon & Vero Turner

The late Mr K Twyman

Solti Patrons

Ageas

John & Manon Antoniazzi Gabor Beyer, through BTO Management Consulting AG Jon Claydon

Mrs Mina Goodman & Miss Suzanne Goodman

Roddy & April Gow

The Jeniffer & Jonathan Harris Charitable Trust

Mr James R.D. Korner Christoph Ladanyi & Dr Sophia Ladanyi-Czernin Robert Markwick & Kasia Robinski The Maurice Marks Charitable Trust

Mr Paris Natar

The Rothschild Foundation

Tom & Phillis Sharpe

The Viney Family

Haitink Patrons

Mark & Elizabeth Adams

Dr Christopher Aldren Mrs Pauline Baumgartner Lady Jane Berrill

Mr Frederick Brittenden David & Yi Yao Buckley Mr Clive Butler

Gill & Garf Collins Mr John H Cook Mr Alistair Corbett Bruno De Kegel Georgy Djaparidze David Ellen

Christopher Fraser OBE David & Victoria Graham Fuller Goldman Sachs International Mr Gavin Graham Moya Greene Mrs Dorothy Hambleton Tony & Susie Hayes Malcolm Herring Catherine Høgel & Ben Mardle Mrs Philip Kan

Rehmet Kassim-Lakha de Morixe Rose & Dudley Leigh Lady Roslyn Marion Lyons Miss Jeanette Martin Duncan Matthews KC Diana & Allan Morgenthau Charitable Trust Dr Karen Morton Mr Roger Phillimore Ruth Rattenbury

The Reed Foundation

The Rind Foundation Sir Bernard Rix David Ross & Line Forestier (Canada)

Carolina & Martin Schwab

Dr Brian Smith Lady Valerie Solti

Mr & Mrs G Stein

Dr Peter Stephenson Miss Anne Stoddart

TFS Loans Limited Marina Vaizey Jenny Watson Guy & Utti Whittaker

Pritchard Donors

Ralph & Elizabeth Aldwinckle Mrs Arlene Beare

Mr Patrick & Mrs Joan Benner Mr Conrad Blakey Dr Anthony Buckland Paul Collins Alastair Crawford Mr Derek B. Gray Mr Roger Greenwood

The HA.SH Foundation Darren & Jennifer Holmes

Honeymead Arts Trust

Mr Geoffrey Kirkham

Drs Frank & Gek Lim Peter Mace

Mr & Mrs David Malpas

Dr David McGibney

Michael & Patricia McLaren-Turner

Mr & Mrs Andrew Neill

Mr Christopher Querée

The Rosalyn & Nicholas Springer Charitable Trust

Timothy Walker CBE AM Christopher Williams Peter Wilson Smith Mr Anthony Yolland

and all other donors who wish to remain anonymous

Artistic Director’s Circle

Anonymous donors

Mrs Aline Foriel-Destezet

Aud Jebsen

In memory of Mrs Rita Reay

Sir Simon & Lady Robey OBE

Orchestra Circle

William & Alex de Winton

Mr & Mrs Philip Kan

Neil Westreich

The American Friends of the London Philharmonic Orchestra

Principal Associates

Richard Buxton

Gill & Garf Collins

In memory of Brenda Lyndoe Casbon

In memory of Ann Marguerite Collins

Sally Groves MBE George Ramishvili

Associates

Mrs Irina Andreeva

In memory of Len & Edna Beech Steven M. Berzin

Ms Veronika BorovikKhilchevskaya

The Candide Trust

Irina Gofman & Mr Rodrik V. G. Cave

Patricia Haitink

The Lambert Family Charitable Trust

Countess Dominique Loredan Stuart & Bianca Roden

In memory of Hazel Amy Smith

The Tsukanov Family

The Viney Family

Gold Patrons

An anonymous donor

Chris Aldren

David & Yi Buckley

In memory of Allner Mavis Channing

Sonja Drexler

Jan & Leni Du Plessis

The Vernon Ellis Foundation

Peter & Fiona Espenhahn

Hamish & Sophie Forsyth Mr Roger Greenwood Malcolm Herring

Thank you

John & Angela Kessler

Julian & Gill Simmonds Eric Tomsett

Andrew & Rosemary Tusa Guy & Utti Whittaker Mr Florian Wunderlich

Silver Patrons

Dame Colette Bowe David Burke & Valerie Graham John & Sam Dawson Bruno De Kegel Ulrike & Benno Engelmann Virginia Gabbertas MBE Dmitry & Ekaterina Gursky

The Jeniffer & Jonathan Harris Charitable Trust Catherine Høgel & Ben Mardle Sir George Iacobescu Jamie & Julia Korner

Mr & Mrs Makharinsky Mr Nikita Mishin Andrew Neill Tom & Phillis Sharpe Mr & Mrs John & Susi Underwood Laurence Watt Grenville & Krysia Williams

Bronze Patrons

Anonymous donors Michael Allen Mr Mark Astaire Nicholas & Christine Beale Mikhail Noskov & Vasilina Bindley Mr Anthony Blaiklock Lorna & Christopher Bown Mr Bernard Bradbury Simon Burke & Rupert King Desmond & Ruth Cecil Mr Evgeny Chichvarkin Mr John H Cook Georgy Djaparidze Deborah Dolce Cameron & Kathryn Doley Mariana Eidelkind & Gene Moldavsky David Ellen Ben Fairhall

Mr Richard & Helen Gillingwater Mr Daniel Goldstein David & Jane Gosman Mr Gavin Graham Lord & Lady Hall Mrs Dorothy Hambleton Martin & Katherine Hattrell Michael & Christine Henry Mr Steve Holliday J Douglas Home

Mr & Mrs Ralph Kanza

Mrs Elena & Mr Oleg Kolobov Rose & Dudley Leigh

Wg. Cdr. & Mrs M T Liddiard OBE

JP RAF

Drs Frank & Gek Lim

Mr Nicholas Little

Geoff & Meg Mann Mrs Elizabeth Meshkvicheva Andrew T Mills

Peter & Lucy Noble Mr Roger Phillimore Mr Michael Posen

Mr Anthony Salz

Ms Nadia Stasyuk Charlotte Stevenson Joe Topley

Mr & Mrs John C Tucker Timothy Walker CBE AM Jenny Watson CBE Grenville & Krysia Williams

Principal Supporters

Anonymous donors

Dr Manon Antoniazzi

Julian & Annette Armstrong Mr John D Barnard

Mr Geoffrey Bateman

Mr Philip Bathard-Smith

Mrs A Beare

Dr Anthony Buckland Dr Simona Cicero & Mr Mario Altieri

Mr Peter Coe

Mrs Pearl Cohen

David & Liz Conway

Mr Alistair Corbett

Ms Mary Anne Cordeiro

Ms Elena Dubinets

Mr Richard Fernyhough Jason George

Mr Christian Grobel

Prof Emeritus John Gruzelier Mark & Sarah Holford Mrs Maureen Hooft-Graafland Per Jonsson

Mr Ian Kapur

Ms Kim J Koch

Ms Elena Lojevsky Mrs Terry Neale John Nickson & Simon Rew Oliver & Josie Ogg

Ms Olga Ovenden Mr James Pickford

Filippo Poli

Sir Bernard Rix

Mr Robert Ross Priscylla Shaw

Martin & Cheryl Southgate

Mr & Mrs G Stein

Dr Peter Stephenson

Joanna Williams

Christopher Williams

Ms Elena Ziskind

Supporters

Anonymous donors

Ralph & Elizabeth Aldwinckle

Mr & Mrs Robert Auerbach

Mrs Julia Beine

Harvey Bengen

Miss YolanDa Brown

Miss Yousun Chae

Mr Julien Chilcott-Monk

Alison Clarke & Leo Pilkington

Mr Joshua Coger

Miss Tessa Cowie

Mr David Devons

Patricia Dreyfus

Mr Martin Fodder

Christopher Fraser OBE Will Gold Ray Harsant

Mr Peter Imhof

The Jackman Family

Mr David MacFarlane

Dame Jane Newell DBE

Mr Stephen Olton

Mari Payne

Mr David Peters

Ms Edwina Pitman

Mr & Mrs Graham & Jean Pugh

Mr Giles Quarme

Mr Kenneth Shaw

Mr Brian Smith

Ms Rika Suzuki

Tony & Hilary Vines

Dr June Wakefield

Mr John Weekes

Mr C D Yates

Hon. Benefactor

Elliott Bernerd

Hon. Life Members

Alfonso Aijón

Kenneth Goode

Carol Colburn Grigor CBE Pehr G Gyllenhammar

Robert Hill

Victoria Robey OBE

Mrs Jackie Rosenfeld OBE

Timothy Walker CBE AM Laurence Watt

We are extremely grateful to all donors who have given generously to the LPO over the past year. Your generosity helps maintain the breadth and depth of the LPO’s activities, as well as supporting the Orchestra both on and off the concert platform.

Thomas Beecham Group Members

David & Yi Buckley

Gill & Garf Collins

William & Alex de Winton Sonja Drexler

The Friends of the LPO Irina Gofman

Roger Greenwood

Dr Barry Grimaldi

Mr & Mrs Philip Kan John & Angela Kessler

Countess Dominique Loredan Sir Simon Robey

Victoria Robey OBE

Bianca & Stuart Roden Caroline, Jamie & Zander Sharp Julian & Gill Simmonds Eric Tomsett

Neil Westreich Guy & Utti Whittaker

Corporate Donor Barclays

LPO Corporate Circle

Principal Berenberg

Bloomberg Carter-Ruck

French Chamber of Commerce

Tutti

Lazard Walpole

Trialist

Sciteb

Preferred Partners

Gusbourne Estate Jeroboams

Lindt & Sprüngli Ltd

OneWelbeck Steinway

In-kind Sponsor

Google Inc

Thank you

Trusts and Foundations

ABO Trust BlueSpark Foundation

The Boltini Trust

Borrows Charitable Trust

The Candide Trust Cockayne – Grants for the Arts

The London Community Foundation

The D’Oyly Carte Charitable Trust Dunard Fund

Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation Foyle Foundation Garrick Charitable Trust John Horniman’s Children’s Trust John Thaw Foundation Institute Adam Mickiewicz Kirby Laing Foundation

The Marchus Trust

The Radcliffe Trust Rivers Foundation Rothschild Foundation

RVW Trust Scops Arts Trust Sir William Boremans' Foundation

The John S Cohen Foundation

The Stanley Picker Trust

The Thriplow Charitable Trust

The Vaughan Williams Charitable Trust

The Victoria Wood Foundation

The Viney Family

The Barbara Whatmore Charitable Trust

and all others who wish to remain anonymous.

Board of the American Friends of the LPO

We are grateful to the Board of the American Friends of the London Philharmonic Orchestra, who assist with fundraising for our activities in the United States of America:

Simon Freakley Chairman

Jon Carter

Jay Goffman

Alexandra Jupin

Natalie Pray

Damien Vanderwilt

Elizabeth Winter

Catherine Høgel Hon. Director

Jenifer L. Keiser, CPA, EisnerAmper LLP

LPO International Board of Governors

Natasha Tsukanova Co-Chair

Martin Höhmann Co-Chair

Mrs Irina Andreeva

Steven M. Berzin

Veronika Borovik-Khilchevskaya Marie-Laure Favre Gilly de Varennes de Bueil

Aline Foriel-Destezet

Irina Gofman

Countess Dominique Loredan

Olivia Ma

George Ramishvili

Jay Stein

London Philharmonic Orchestra Administration

Board of Directors

Dr Catherine C. Høgel Chair

Lord Hall of Birkenhead CBE Vice-Chair

Martin Höhmann* President Mark Vines* Vice-President Kate Birchall*

David Buckley

David Burke

Bruno De Kegel

Deborah Dolce

Elena Dubinets

Tanya Joseph Hugh Kluger*

Katherine Leek*

Al MacCuish Minn Majoe*

Tania Mazzetti*

Jamie Njoku-Goodwin

Andrew Tusa

Neil Westreich Simon Freakley (Ex officio –Chairman of the American Friends of the London Philharmonic Orchestra)

*Player-Director

Advisory Council

Martin Höhmann Chairman Christopher Aldren Dr Manon Antoniazzi

Roger Barron

Richard Brass

Helen Brocklebank YolanDa Brown

Simon Burke

Simon Callow CBE

Desmond Cecil CMG

Sir Alan Collins KCVO CMG Andrew Davenport Guillaume Descottes

Cameron Doley

Christopher Fraser OBE

Jonathan Harris CBE FRICS Marianna Hay MBE

Nicholas Hely-Hutchinson DL Amanda Hill

Rehmet Kassim-Lakha Jamie Korner

Geoff Mann Clive Marks OBE FCA Stewart McIlwham Andrew Neill

Nadya Powell

Sir Bernard Rix

Victoria Robey OBE Baroness Shackleton

Thomas Sharpe KC

Julian Simmonds

Barry Smith

Martin Southgate

Chris Viney

Laurence Watt Elizabeth Winter

General Administration

Elena Dubinets

Artistic Director

David Burke Chief Executive

Chantelle Vircavs PA to the Executive

Concert Management

Roanna Gibson Concerts and Planning Director

Graham Wood Concerts and Recordings Manager

Fabio Sarlo Glyndebourne and Projects Manager Maddy Clarke Tours Manager

Alison Jones Concerts and Recordings Co-ordinator Robert Winup Concerts and Tours Assistant Matthew Freeman Recordings Consultant Andrew Chenery Orchestra Personnel Manager

Sarah Thomas Martin Sargeson Librarians

Laura Kitson Stage and Operations Manager

Stephen O’Flaherty Deputy Operations Manager

Freddie Jackson Deputy Stage Manager

Felix Lo Orchestra and Auditions Manager

Finance Frances Slack

Finance Director

Dayse Guilherme Finance Manager

Jean-Paul Ramotar Finance and IT Officer

Education and Community Talia Lash Education and Community Director

Hannah Foakes Rebecca Parslow Education and Community Project Managers

Lowri Davies Education and Community Co-ordinator Development

Laura Willis Development Director Rosie Morden Individual Giving Manager Siân Jenkins Corporate Relations Manager

Anna Quillin Trusts and Foundations Manager

Katurah Morrish Development Events Manager

Eleanor Conroy

Al Levin

Development Assistants

Nick Jackman Campaigns and Projects Director

Kirstin Peltonen Development Associate Marketing

Kath Trout Marketing and Communications Director

Mairi Warren Marketing Manager

Rachel Williams Publications Manager

Harrie Mayhew

Website Manager

Gavin Miller

Sales and Ticketing Manager

Ruth Haines

Press and PR Manager

Sophie Harvey Digital and Residencies Marketing Manager

Greg Felton Digital Creative

Alicia Hartley Marketing Assistant

Archives Philip Stuart Discographer

Gillian Pole Recordings Archive

Professional Services

Charles Russell Speechlys Solicitors

Crowe Clark Whitehill LLP Auditors

Dr Barry Grimaldi

Honorary Doctor

Mr Chris Aldren

Honorary ENT Surgeon

Mr Simon Owen-Johnstone Hon. Orthopaedic Surgeon

London Philharmonic Orchestra

89 Albert Embankment

London SE1 7TP

Tel: 020 7840 4200

Box Office: 020 7840 4242

Email: admin@lpo.org.uk lpo.org.uk

Cover illustration

Simon Pemberton/Heart 2022/23 season identity

JMG Studio

Printer John Good Ltd