Classical star joins Royal Philharmonic
Rising star Mariam Batsashvili will be the soloist at concert of Hungarian and Russian music performed by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra under the baton of Alexander Shelley.
Mariam is the first woman ever to take First Prize at the International Franz Liszt Piano Competition and is quickly becoming well known in the classical world. Hand-picked by the BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artist scheme, she will perform Liszt’s ecstatic Piano Concerto No 1 in a programme that also includes Tchaikovsky and Kodály at the Corn Exchange on November 30.
Franz Liszt was the first and greatest piano virtuoso and showman of the 19th century, inventing an intensely theatrical style which left Victorian-era audiences swooning with passionate feelings. He became famous for the white gloves he wore, which he would dramatically strip from his hands before touching the piano keys. His used handkerchiefs were collector’s items and women poured his undrunk wine or coffee into glass phials to be displayed like sacred relics.
These theatrics perhaps would go down poorly with jaded modern audiences. Nevertheless, Batsashvili has won accolades for her ability to interpret this same 19th century repertoire with elegance and feeling. As a German newspaper critic wrote after a recent performance, she plays ‘powerfully – but not with violence, rather with grandeur.’
This concerto puts Liszt’s exotic Romantic spirit on full display, with cascades of sound, tender duets between piano and clarinet, and rousing fanfares from the strings and brass. The piece’s meaning, however, remains enigmatic. When asked to explain his composition, Liszt strolled over to a piano, plunking out the main theme as he remarked: ‘Das versteht ihr alle nicht’ (‘None of you understands this’).
In the second half of the programme, conductor Alexander Shelley leads the orchestra in an intense performance of Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony. Thanks to voluminous correspondence between Tchaikovsky and his longtime patron, the Russian businesswoman Nadezhda von Meck, we have a lurid pen-portrait of his state of mind as he composed it. To take a representative example:
‘This is fate... which hangs above your head like the sword of Damocles, and unwaveringly, constantly poisons the soul. You can only reconcile yourself to it, and languish fruitlessly.’
Despite his fruitless languishing, Tchaikovsky managed four roller-coaster movement which veer from fateful fanfares to poignant melancholy before hurtling through a whirlwind finale and it remains one of his best-loved symphonic works.
Like Franz Liszt, Zoltán Kodály was Hungarian and his Dances of Galánta evoke the traditional folk music from this part of the world (although the town of Galánta is now in Slovakia, a reminder of how Hungary’s borders shrank as a result of the Great War). Less exotic and high-kicking than some other works which purport to interpret Magyar peasant music, the Dances feature rich orchestral colours, ravishing melodies, and a high-energy final movement which brings this long-lost world to life.
Tickets: from £32. Box office: Cornex.co.uk
Coming soon at the Cambridge Orchestral series:
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 1 at 7:30pm
Cambridge Corn Exchange, Cambridge
Philharmonia Orchestra
Beethoven Coriolan Overture
Mendelssohn Violin Concerto
Rachmaninov Symphony No. 2
Violin Leticia Moreno
Conductor Paavo Jarvi
£42, £38, £32 (standard), £17 (no view), £12.50 (student)
Box Office 01223 357 851
cornex.co.uk
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 22 at 7:30pm
Cambridge Corn Exchange, Cambridge
Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
Mozart Overture from La clemenza da Tito
Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 1
Beethoven Symphony No. 3 ‘Eroica’
Piano Boris Giltburg
Conductor Antony Hermus
£42, £38, £32 (standard), £17 (no view), £12.50 (student)
Box Office 01223 357 851
cornex.co.uk
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 27 at 7:30pm
Cambridge Corn Exchange, Cambridge
Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
Vaughan Williams Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis
Mozart Symphony No. 36 ‘Linz’
Beethoven Violin Concerto
Violin/ Conductor Pinchas Zukerman
£42, £38, £32 (standard), £17 (no view), £12.50 (student)
Box Office 01223 357 851
cornex.co.uk
THURSDAY, APRIL 25 at 7:30pm
Cambridge Corn Exchange, Cambridge
European Union Chamber Union
Warlock Capriol Suite
Mozart Concerto for Flute and Harp
Barber Adagio for Strings
Haydn Symphony No. 44 ‘Trauer’
Harp Catrin Finch
Flute Fiona Slominska
Conductor Hans-Peter Hofmann
£42, £38, £32 (standard), £17 (no view), £12.50 (student)
Box Office 01223 357 851
cornex.co.uk
TUESDAY, MAY 21 at 7:30pm
Cambridge Corn Exchange, Cambridge
Russian Philharmonic of Novosibirsk
Rimsky-Korsakov Capriccio Espagnol
Rachmaninov Rhapsody on a Theme by Paganini
Glinka Overture to Ruslan and Ludmila
Rachmaninov Symphonic Dances
Piano Sergey Redkin
Conductor Thomas Sanderling
42, £38, £32 (standard), £17 (no view), £12.50 (student)
Box Office 01223 357 851
