Sinfonieorchester Basel
Frank Peter Zimmermann, violin
Robert Trevino, conductor
Igor Strawinsky (1882–1971):
Concerto for Violin and Orchestra in D major (1931)
Sergei Rachmaninow (1873–1943):
Symphony No. 2 E minor, op. 27 (1908)
When the famous piano concertos by Sergei Rachmaninoff are performed, pianists knowingly refer to them as 'Rach 2' or 'Rach 3'. To mark the 150th anniversary of the composer's birth, this concert programme includes a work that is equally indebted to the musical melancholy of late Romantic Russia. Rachmaninov's 2nd Symphony arose like a phoenix from the ashes of the disastrous premiere of his 1st Symphony. Plagued by a deep crisis of meaning, Rachmaninoff found seclusion and tranquillity in Dresden in 1906/07 in order to dare to tackle the supreme discipline of the symphony again after twelve years. The result is a work between transfigured melancholy and life-affirming euphoria - a mixture that the Russian composer maintained even during his forced exile in America and in Weggis, Lucerne.
Switzerland was also a place of refuge for Igor Stravinsky, and he regularly stayed on Lake Geneva from 1910 onwards. The composer slipped into many different style dresses during his creative period - for his only violin concerto, for example, he explored baroque forms. It was premiered in 1931 at the Berlin radio station - as one of the first live broadcasts of the Reichsrundfunkgesellschaft of the time.
RACH 150
Symphony Concert
Wednesday, 25 January 2023
07:30 PM
6.30 pm: Concert introduction with Lea Vaterlaus
The concert will be followed by a public critique session with Benjamin Herzog (moderator) in the Musiksaal.