If you enjoy Dvořák’s ‘New World’ Symphony (No.9), you’re going to love the one that he wrote back home in the heart of Bohemia. Hymn tunes, birdsong and folk dances; village bands, summer sunsets and blazing triumph – they’re all here, in what might be the single happiest symphony by any great composer (and, definitely, one of the most tuneful). For guest conductor Eduardo Strausser, it’s a natural way to end a concert that positively glows with Central European sunshine. The award-winning violinist Liya Petrova steps into the limelight in Korngold’s soaring Violin Concerto – composed in Hollywood by a composer with his heart in Vienna. And there’s a chance to discover a real neglected gem: the folk-inspired Suita Rustica by Vítězslava Kaprálová, who lit up Czech music between the wars.
The harp takes centre stage in this free early-evening performance by members of the Philharmonia Orchestra.
Prokofiev’s mind-blowing Second Symphony, plus early Beethoven and a charming opener from Schubert.
‘The greatest graduation piece of all time’ crowns this evening of 20th century classics.
England’s dreaming: Sakari Oramo rediscovers rare and wonderful British masterpieces by Vaughan Williams, Doreen Carwithen and Malcolm Arnold.
Imagine a swelling river of sound; a musical voyage that begins amid the tranquillity of nature and ends in a surge of triumph. That’s Sibelius’s Second Symphony, and there are few experiences in classical music more invigorating, or more stirring. For the young Finnish conductor Tarmo Peltokoski, Sibelius is a national hero. There’s another tale about memory to be told here, as Canadian pianist Jan Lisiecki takes centre stage to showcase the grandeur and glory of Beethoven’s mighty ‘Emperor’ Concerto – a work dedicated to the composer’s patron and friend, Archduke Rudolf.
Pianist Sunwook Kim multi-tasks with the high octane Chamber Orchestra of Europe in a concert featuring a Beethoven double.
The Philharmonia pairs Shostakovich’s extraordinary final symphony with the famous overture quoted in its first movement.
Orchestral fireworks with early Shostakovich and Schnittke, joined by the London Symphony Chorus for some stirring Brahms.
The artistry of the multiple award-winning, ‘stunningly gifted’ pianist Nobuyuki Tsujii brings to life some of the instrument’s greatest classics.
Elgar’s Enigma Variations began as a parlour game, a series of musical portraits of the composer’s nearest and dearest. It grew into the warmest, tenderest and most stirring masterpiece in all of British music: who isn’t moved by the profound emotion of Nimrod? Few artists understand British music better than former English National Opera music director Martyn Brabbins, and tonight Enigma crowns an all-British programme that opens with the serenity of Vaughan Williams and stars another great champion of British music, pianist Mark Bebbington, in the Piano Concerto by Sir Arthur Bliss. It’s not heard all that often, but it’s an absolute knockout: an art deco blockbuster, written on the eve of the Second World War. The greatest piano concerto you’ve never heard? Judge for yourself…
Due to personal circumstances beyond his control, Mark Bebbinton is unable to perform in this concert as previously advertised. We are delighted that Peter Donohoe has agreed to perform in his place.
Sakari Oramo conducts Mahler’s playful Fourth Symphony – and plays the violin too, as Kurt Weill retells the myth of Orpheus in his own, utterly original style.
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Three outstanding young singers unite in a programme of love, loss, and remembrance, where Schubert and Errollyn Wallen are entwined in Britten’s five haunting canticles.
‘I think and feel in sounds’ said Maurice Ravel, and in his ballet Daphnis and Chloé you can almost feel the sun on the back of your neck, hear every flurry of birdsong and see each ray of glistening light. It’s as fantastic as it sounds, and this rare full-length performance under LPO Principal Conductor Edward Gardner is just the centrepiece of a whole evening of orchestral wonder. In La valse, memory plays a part, with its dangerously seductive rhythms portraying a gorgeous, haunted vision of a civilisation dancing into the abyss. This concert has been especially developed with the Southbank Centre and Circa, Australia’s internationally renowned circus company, and will feature cross-artform performance, with further details to be announced.
Please note start times.
Please note there will be no interval.
‘I think and feel in sounds’ said Maurice Ravel, and in his ballet Daphnis and Chloé you can almost feel the sun on the back of your neck, hear every flurry of birdsong and see each ray of glistening light. It’s as fantastic as it sounds, and this rare full-length performance under LPO Principal Conductor Edward Gardner is just the centrepiece of a whole evening of orchestral wonder. In La valse, memory plays a part, with its dangerously seductive rhythms portraying a gorgeous, haunted vision of a civilisation dancing into the abyss. This concert has been especially developed with the Southbank Centre and Circa, Australia’s internationally renowned circus company, and will feature cross-artform performance, with further details to be announced.
Please note start times.
Please note there will be no interval.
Part of Southbank Centre’s festival Multitudes
Stephen Hough plays Beethoven and Sakari Oramo conducts Mahler’s First Symphony. Genius, pure and simple, from the BBC Symphony Orchestra.
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Chineke! Orchestra joins forces with George the Poet for a night of music, spoken word and poetry around the themes of Resilience, Identity, Strength and Equality.
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Experience a kaleidoscopic collision of music and dance through the ages in a one-of-a-kind collaboration between Clark, Manchester Collective and Melanie Lane.
As Hitler’s armies surrounded the city of Leningrad, and bombs rained down on a starving population, Dmitri Shostakovich sat down and – somehow - composed his Seventh Symphony. Written for massed battalions of musicians, this is music from the front line – a roar of defiance from an unbreakable city – and Vasily Petrenko’s recording was described by one critic as ‘devastating’. It’s a stupendous climax to a concert that’s all about struggle and resistance: whether it’s Sibelius defying Russian imperialism with a mighty hymn to his native Finland, or the poet Walt Whitman’s pleas for tolerance, set to music by the exiled Kurt Weill. Singing them today is the fabulous British baritone Roderick Williams: a born communicator at the heart of a truly epic programme.