Program
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770–1827)
Symphony No. 7 in A Major, Op. 92 (1811–1812)
Poco sostenuto – Vivace
Allegretto
Presto
Allegro con brio
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791)
Overture to the opera Le Nozze di Figaro, K. 492 (1785–1786)
Piano Concerto No. 23 in A Major, K. 488 (1786)
Allegro
Adagio
Allegro assai
musicAeterna Orchestra
Conductor – Teodor Currentzis
Soloist – TBA
Details
The October programme by Teodor Currentzis and the musicAeterna Orchestra combines the most luminous works by Ludwig van Beethoven and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The French novelist Romain Rolland compared Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7, completed in 1812, to ‘the joy of a river overflowing its banks and flooding the surrounding country.’ The finale of Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 23, created simultaneously with the opera Le Nozze di Figaro, musicologist Alfred Einstein characterized as follows: ‘It seems as if a fresh wind and a bright ray of sunlight burst into a stuffy and dark room.’
Just as light cannot be discerned without shadow, so in the works of Beethoven and Mozart, joy is not unclouded. The second movement of Beethoven’s symphony, Allegretto, is a glorified funeral march filled with restrained sorrow. The middle movement of Mozart’s concerto, the famous Siciliana, is the perfect embodiment of melancholy in music. They both have long turned into independent phenomena of high and mass culture. Like the overture to Le Nozze di Figaro, they are often performed on their own. Teodor Currentzis and musicAeterna put these ‘hits’ of Beethoven and Mozart back to their symphonic and historical context. Music will be performed in an authentic tuning A=430 Hz on historical instruments.
The orchestra has repeatedly turned to the compositions of the programme. Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7 was performed in Russia and at the Salzburg Festival, recorded on the Sony Classical label, and a video footage of an experiment combining the live performance of the work accompanied with a dance performance by Sasha Waltz’s troupe at the Delphi Amphitheatre is available in the cinema theatres. Mozart’s opera Le Nozze di Figaro was staged under the musical direction of Teodor Currentzis in Novosibirsk and Perm Opera and Ballet theatres, and in 2014 Sony Classical label released its recording. The current interpretation of this music, as is typical of Teodor Currentzis, will be enriched with fresh ideas and reveal new facets.