28 November 2012 programme notes

Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor VLADIMIR JUROWSKI*Principal Guest Conductor YANNICK NÉZET-SÉGUINLeader pIETER SChOEMANComposer in Residence JULIAN ANDERSONPatron hRh ThE DUKE OF KENT KG

Chief Executive and Artistic Director TIMOThY WALKER AM

pROGRAMME £3

CONTENTS 2 Welcome 3 About the Orchestra 4 Tonight’s performers5 Vladimir Jurowski 6–9 Artist biographies10 London Philharmonic Choir 11 Programme notes & texts21 Birthday Appeal 2012/1322 LPO administration23 Supporters

The timings shown are not precise and

are given only as a guide.

* supported by the Tsukanov Family and one anonymous donor

CONCERT PRESENTED BY THE LONDON PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA

SOUThBANK CENTRE’S ROYAL FESTIVAL hALLWednesday 28 November 2012 | 7.30pm

VLADIMIR JUROWSKI conductorROBERT hAYWARD narrator†OMAR EBRAhIM Fučík‡MALCOLM SINCLAIR Voice‡ ANNABEL ARDEN director‡GENTLEMEN OF ThE LONDON phILhARMONIC ChOIR

BEEThOVEN Overture, Fidelio (6’)

SChOENBERG Ode to Napoleon Bonaparte (14’)

SChOENBERG A Survivor from Warsaw (7’)

Interval

NONO Julius Fučík (UK premiere) (10’)

BEEThOVEN Symphony No. 5 (35’)

Please note that the Beethoven will follow the Nono without a break and you are requested not to applaud until the end of the Symphony.

Free pre-concert discussion 6.15–6.45pm | Royal Festival hall

Composer and academic Silvina Milstein looks at the works of Nono and Schoenberg.

Barlines free post-concert event The Clore Ballroom, Royal Festival hall

Artists involved in the performance will discuss the evening’s programme.

††

‡

2 | London Philharmonic Orchestra

WELCOME

WELCOME TO SOUThBANK CENTRE

We hope you enjoy your visit. We have a Duty Manager available at all times. If you have any queries please ask any member of staff for assistance.

Eating, drinking and shopping? Southbank Centre shops and restaurants include Foyles, EAT, Giraffe, Strada, YO! Sushi, wagamama, Le Pain Quotidien, Las Iguanas, ping pong, Canteen, Caffè Vergnano 1882, Skylon, Concrete and Feng Sushi, as well as cafes, restaurants and shops inside Royal Festival Hall, Queen Elizabeth Hall and Hayward Gallery.

If you wish to get in touch with us following your visit please contact the Visitor Experience Team at Southbank Centre, Belvedere Road, London SE1 8XX, phone 020 7960 4250, or email [email protected] We look forward to seeing you again soon.

A few points to note for your comfort and enjoyment:

phOTOGRAphY is not allowed in the auditorium.

LATECOMERS will only be admitted to the auditorium if there is a suitable break in the performance.

RECORDING is not permitted in the auditorium without the prior consent of Southbank Centre. Southbank Centre reserves the right to confiscate video or sound equipment and hold it in safekeeping until the performance has ended.

MOBILES, pAGERS AND WATChES should be switched off before the performance begins.

WELCOME

The Deutsche Bank BrightSparks Series

As one of the flagship projects in its extensive Corporate Citizenship programme, Deutsche Bank has been supporting the London Philharmonic Orchestra’s BrightSparks schools’ concerts since 2001. Deutsche Bank’s generous funding ensures that children and their teachers have the opportunity to experience a live performance by the Orchestra at no cost. Across the year, the series of eight concerts at Royal Festival Hall reaches approximately 16,000 young people in full-time education. This year the series has been extended to include concerts for A-Level music students for the first time, ensuring that pupils aged 5 to 18 can experience the Deutsche Bank BrightSparks Series.

In addition to its support of music education, Deutsche Bank’s Corporate Citizenship programme spans a range of themes aimed at addressing disadvantage, promoting social mobility and supporting emerging artists.

Globally, hundreds of thousands of people each year participate in education programmes supported by Deutsche Bank. At this evening’s concert we are delighted to welcome young people from across London whose tickets have been provided by Deutsche Bank.

FSC_57678 LPO 14 January 2011 15/09/2011 12:30 Page 1

London Philharmonic Orchestra | 3

LONDON phILhARMONIC ORChESTRA

The London Philharmonic Orchestra is one of the world’s finest orchestras, balancing a long and distinguished history with a reputation as one of the UK’s most adventurous and forward-looking orchestras. As well as giving classical concerts, the Orchestra also records film and video game soundtracks, has its own record label, and reaches thousands of Londoners every year through activities for schools and local communities.

The Orchestra was founded by Sir Thomas Beecham in 1932, and since then its Principal Conductors have included Sir Adrian Boult, Bernard Haitink, Sir Georg Solti, Klaus Tennstedt and Kurt Masur. The current Principal Conductor is Vladimir Jurowski, appointed in 2007, and Yannick Nézet-Séguin is Principal Guest Conductor.

The Orchestra is Resident Orchestra at Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall in London, where it has performed since it opened in 1951, giving around 40 concerts there each season. 2012/13 highlights include three concerts with Vladimir Jurowski based around the theme of War and Peace in collaboration with the Russian National Orchestra; Kurt Weill’s The Threepenny Opera, also conducted by Jurowski; 20th-century American works with Marin Alsop; Haydn and Strauss with Yannick Nézet-Séguin; and the UK premiere of Carl Vine’s Second Piano Concerto with pianist Piers Lane under Vassily Sinaisky. Throughout 2013 the Orchestra will collaborate with Southbank Centre on The Rest Is Noise festival, based on Alex Ross’s book of the same name and charting the 20th century’s key musical works and historical events.

The Orchestra has flourishing residencies in Brighton and Eastbourne, and performs regularly around the UK. Every summer, the Orchestra leaves London for four months and takes up its annual residency accompanying the famous Glyndebourne Festival Opera, where it has been Resident Symphony Orchestra since 1964. The Orchestra also tours internationally, performing concerts to sell-out audiences worldwide. Tours in the 2012/13 season include visits to Spain, Germany, France, Switzerland, the USA and Austria.

The London Philharmonic Orchestra has recorded many blockbuster scores, from The Lord of the Rings trilogy to Lawrence of Arabia, The Mission, East is East, Hugo, and The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. It also broadcasts regularly on television and radio, and in 2005 established its own record label. There are now nearly 70 releases available on CD and to download. Recent additions include Dvořák’s Stabat Mater under Neeme Järvi; Tchaikovsky’s Symphonies Nos. 4 & 5 with Vladimir Jurowski; Sibelius’s Symphonies Nos. 5 & 6 under the late Paavo Berglund; and the world premiere of Ravi Shankar’s First Symphony conducted by David Murphy.

In summer 2012 the London Philharmonic Orchestra performed as part of The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Pageant on the River Thames, and was also chosen to record all the world’s national anthems for the London 2012 Olympics.

The London Philharmonic Orchestra maintains an energetic programme of activities for young people and local communities. Highlights include the Deutsche Bank BrightSparks Series; the Leverhulme Young Composers project; and the Foyle Future Firsts orchestral training programme for outstanding young players. Over recent years, developments in technology and social networks have enabled the Orchestra to reach even more people worldwide: all its recordings are available to download from iTunes and, as well as a YouTube channel, news blog, iPhone app and regular podcasts, the Orchestra has a lively presence on Facebook and Twitter.

Find out more and get involved!

lpo.org.uk

facebook.com/londonphilharmonicorchestra

twitter.com/LpOrchestra

‘Jurowski and the LPO provided the impossible that is perfection ... As things stand now, the LPO must rate as an example to all orchestras.’Musicalcriticism.com, July 2011 (BBC Proms 2011: Liszt, Bartók and Kodály)


TONIGhT’S pERFORMERS

First ViolinsPieter Schoeman* LeaderVesselin Gellev Sub-Leader

Chair supported by John & Angela Kessler

Ilyoung ChaeChair supported by Moya Greene

Katalin VarnagyCatherine CraigThomas EisnerTina Gruenberg Martin Höhmann Geoffrey LynnRobert PoolSarah StreatfeildYang Zhang

Second ViolinsFredrik Paulsson

Guest PrincipalJeongmin KimJoseph MaherFiona HighamAshley StevensMarie-Anne MairesseNancy ElanDean WilliamsonSioni WilliamsPeter GrahamMila Mustakova Elizabeth Baldey

ViolasFiona Winning

Guest PrincipalRobert DuncanGregory AronovichKatharine LeekBenedetto Pollani Laura Vallejo Susanne Martens Isabel PereiraDaniel Cornford Martin Fenn

CellosKristina Blaumane PrincipalFrancis Bucknall Laura DonoghueJonathan Ayling

Chair supported by Caroline, Jamie & Zander Sharp

Gregory WalmsleySantiago Carvalho†Sue SutherleySusanna Riddell

Double BassesKevin Rundell* PrincipalTim Gibbs Co-PrincipalLaurence LovelleGeorge PenistonRichard LewisKenneth Knussen

FlutesSue Thomas Principal

Chair supported by the Sharp Family

Ian MullinStewart McIlwham*

piccoloStewart McIlwham*

Principal

OboesIan Hardwick PrincipalAngela Tennick

Cor AnglaisSue Bohling Principal

Chair supported by Julian & Gill Simmonds

ClarinetsNicholas Carpenter*

PrincipalEmily Meredith

Bass ClarinetPaul Richards Principal

E-flat Clarinet Katie Lockhart

SaxophonesMartin RobertsonTimothy Holmes

BassoonsGareth Newman* PrincipalDominic Tyler

ContrabassoonSimon Estell Principal

hornsJohn Ryan* PrincipalMartin HobbsMark Vines Co-PrincipalGareth Mollison

TrumpetsPaul Beniston* PrincipalAnne McAneney*

Chair supported by Geoff & Meg Mann

Nicholas Betts Co-Principal

TrombonesMark Templeton* PrincipalDavid Whitehouse

Bass TromboneLyndon Meredith Principal

TubaLee Tsarmaklis* Principal

TimpaniSimon Carrington* Principal

percussionAndrew Barclay* Principal

Chair supported by Andrew Davenport

Keith MillarJeremy CornesIgnacio Molins Eddy Hackett

harpsRachel Masters* PrincipalStephanie Beck

piano Catherine Edwards

RepetiteurHelen Crayford

Assistant Conductor Jeremy Bines

Chair supported by an anonymous donor

production Assistant Peter Yarde Martin

* Holds a professorial appointment in London

† Chevalier of the Brazilian Order of Rio Branco

Chair Supporters

The London Philharmonic Orchestra also acknowledges the following chair supporters whose player is not present at this concert:

David & Victoria Graham Fuller


© C

hri

s C

hri

stod

oulo

u

VLADIMIR JUROWSKIPrincipal Conductor and Artistic Advisor

One of today’s most sought-after and dynamic conductors, acclaimed worldwide for his incisive musicianship and adventurous artistic commitment, Vladimir Jurowski was born in Moscow, and completed the first

part of his musical studies at the Music College of the Moscow Conservatory. In 1990 he relocated with his family to Germany, continuing his studies at the High Schools of Music in Dresden and Berlin. In 1995 he made his international debut at the Wexford Festival conducting Rimsky-Korsakov’s May Night, and the same year saw his debut at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, with Nabucco.

Vladimir Jurowski has been Music Director of Glyndebourne Festival Opera since 2001, and in 2003 was appointed Principal Guest Conductor of the London Philharmonic Orchestra, becoming the Orchestra’s Principal Conductor in September 2007. He also holds the titles of Principal Artist of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and Artistic Director of the Russian State Academic Symphony Orchestra. He has also held the positions of First Kapellmeister of the Komische Oper, Berlin (1997–2001); Principal Guest Conductor of the Teatro Comunale di Bologna (2000–03); and Principal Guest Conductor of the Russian National Orchestra (2005–09).

Vladimir Jurowski is a regular guest with many leading orchestras in both Europe and North America, including the Berlin and Oslo Philharmonic orchestras; the Dresden Staatskapelle; the Leipzig Gewandhausorchester; the Tonhalle Orchester Zurich; and the Royal Concertgebouw, Philadelphia, Chicago Symphony, Bavarian Radio Symphony and Mahler Chamber orchestras. Highlights of the 2012/13 season and beyond include his debuts with the Vienna Philharmonic, Boston Symphony, New York Philharmonic, NHK Symphony and San Francisco Symphony orchestras, and return visits to the Chamber Orchestra of Europe; the Tonhalle Orchester Zurich; the Accademia di Santa Cecilia; and the Philadelphia, St Petersburg Philharmonic, Royal Concertgebouw and Chicago Symphony orchestras.

Jurowski made his debut at the Metropolitan Opera, New York, in 1999 with Rigoletto, and has since returned for Jenůfa, The Queen of Spades and Hansel and Gretel. He has conducted Parsifal and Wozzeck at Welsh National Opera; War and Peace at the Opera National de Paris; Eugene Onegin at Teatro alla Scala, Milan; Ruslan and Ludmila at the Bolshoi Theatre; and Iolanta and Die Teufel von Loudon at the Dresden Semperoper, as well as The Magic Flute, La Cenerentola, Otello, Macbeth, Falstaff, Tristan und Isolde, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Don Giovanni, The Rake’s Progress, The Cunning Little Vixen and Peter Eötvös’s Love and Other Demons at Glyndebourne Festival Opera. Future engagements include new productions of Ariadne auf Naxos at Glyndebourne; Die Frau ohne Schatten at the Metropolitan Opera; Moses und Aron at the Komische Oper, Berlin; and The Fiery Angel at the Bayerische Staatsoper in Munich.

Jurowski’s discography includes the first ever recording of the cantata Exil by Giya Kancheli for ECM; Meyerbeer’s L’etoile du Nord for Marco Polo; Massenet’s Werther for BMG; and a series of records for PentaTone with the Russian National Orchestra. The London Philharmonic Orchestra has released a wide selection of his live recordings on its LPO Live label, including Brahms’s Symphonies Nos. 1 and 2; Mahler’s Symphony No. 2; Rachmaninoff’s Symphonic Dances; Tchaikovsky’s Symphonies 1, 4, 5, 6 and Manfred; and works by Turnage, Holst, Britten, Shostakovich, Honegger and Haydn. His tenure as Music Director at Glyndebourne has been documented in a CD release of Prokofiev’s Betrothal in a Monastery, and DVD releases of his performances of La Cenerentola, Gianni Schicchi, Die Fledermaus, Don Giovanni, and Rachmaninoff’s The Miserly Knight. Other DVD releases include Hansel and Gretel from the Metropolitan Opera New York; his first concert as the London Philharmonic Orchestra’s Principal Conductor featuring works by Wagner, Berg and Mahler; and DVDs with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment (Beethoven’s Symphonies Nos. 4 and 7) and the Chamber Orchestra of Europe (Strauss and Ravel), all released by Medici Arts.

Vladimir Jurowski’s position as Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor of the London Philharmonic Orchestra is generously supported by the Tsukanov Family and one anonymous donor.


© P

atri

ck H

arri

son

Pieter Schoeman was appointed Leader of the LPO in 2008, having previously been Co-Leader since 2002.

Born in South Africa, he made his solo debut aged 10 with the Cape Town Symphony Orchestra.

He studied with Jack de Wet in South Africa, winning numerous competitions including the 1984 World Youth Concerto Competition in the US. In 1987 he was offered the Heifetz Chair of Music scholarship to study with Eduard Schmieder in Los Angeles and in 1991 his talent was spotted by Pinchas Zukerman, who recommended that he move to New York to study with Sylvia Rosenberg. In 1994 he became her teaching assistant at Indiana University, Bloomington.

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 Southbank Centre’s Queen Elizabeth Hall in London. As a chamber musician he regularly performs at London’s prestigious Wigmore Hall.

As a soloist with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, Pieter has performed Arvo Pärt’s Double Concerto with Boris Garlitsky, Brahms’s Double Concerto with Kristina Blaumane, and Britten’s Double Concerto with Alexander Zemtsov, which was recorded and released on the Orchestra’s own record label to great critical acclaim. He has recorded numerous violin solos with the London Philharmonic Orchestra for Chandos, Opera Rara, Naxos, X5, the BBC and for American film and television, and led the Orchestra in its soundtrack recordings for The Lord of the Rings trilogy.

In 1995 Pieter became Co-Leader of the Orchestre Philharmonique de Nice. Since then he has appeared frequently as Guest Leader with the Barcelona, Bordeaux, Lyon, Baltimore and BBC symphony orchestras, and the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra.

Pieter is a Professor of Violin at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance.

pIETER SChOEMANLeader

Robert Hayward studied at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama and the National Opera Studio, and made his professional opera debut singing the title role in Don Giovanni for Glyndebourne Touring Opera in 1986.

Since then he has performed at the Royal Opera House, English National Opera, Bayerische Staatsoper Munich, Frankfurt Opera, Welsh National Opera, Opera North, Scottish Opera, Glyndebourne Festival and Touring Opera, Houston Grand Opera, New Israeli Opera and Minnesota Opera. His repertoire includes Wotan and the Wanderer in the Ring Cycle; Amfortas in Parsifal; Jokanaan in Salome; Figaro and Count Almaviva in The Marriage of Figaro; the title roles in Eugene Onegin, Don Giovanni, Mazeppa, The Flying Dutchman, Falstaff and Macbeth; Iago in Otello; Ford in Falstaff; Scarpia in Tosca; Marcello in La bohème; Escamillo in Carmen; Tomsky in The Queen of Spades; Nick Shadow in The Rake’s Progress; Mandryka in Arabella; Golaud in Pelléas et Mélisande; Kurwenal in Tristan und Isolde; Prince Ivan Khovansky in Khovanshchina; Simone in A Florentine Tragedy; and Telramund in Lohengrin.

He has appeared with many of the UK’s leading orchestras including the BBC Philharmonic; the Hallé; and the Bournemouth Symphony, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic and Royal Scottish National orchestras.

Recent and forthcoming operatic engagements include Fidelio for Welsh National Opera; From the House of the Dead, The Makropulos Case and Peter Grimes for Opera North; The Makropulos Case for Opéra de Nantes; Salome with Opéra de Montréal; Il prigioniero, the title role in Bluebeard’s Castle and Telramund in Lohengrin for Frankfurt Opera; The Damnation of Faust for Staatstheater Stuttgart; and the title role in Mazeppa and Moses in Moses und Aron both for the Komische Oper Berlin. Concert appearances include a performance with the Cambridge University Music Society under Sir Mark Elder.

ROBERT hAYWARDNarrator (Ode to Napoleon Bonaparte; A Survivor from Warsaw)


British actor Malcolm Sinclair has played leading roles at the National Theatre, the Donmar, the Almeida and the Royal Shakespeare Company. Most recently he played one of the leading roles in George Bernard

Shaw’s The Doctor’s Dilemma at the National Theatre directed by Nadia Fall, and he will soon begin rehearsing Simon Gray’s Quartermaine’s Terms alongside Rowan Atkinson at Wyndham’s Theatre.

Other recent theatre appearances include Rattigan’s Nijinsky (Chichester Festival Theatre), Racing Demon (Sheffield Crucible), The Habit Of Art (Royal National Theatre), The Power Of Yes (Royal National Theatre), Ivanov (Donmar Warehouse) and Rosmersholm (Almeida). In 2001 he won the Clarence Derwent Award for his role as Gavin Ryng-Maine in the Royal National Theatre’s production of Alan Ayckbourn’s House/Garden. He was also nominated for an Olivier Award as best supporting actor for his performance as Major Miles Flack in Peter Nichols’s Privates on Parade.

Malcolm is perhaps best known for his role as Assistant Chief Constable Freddy Fisher in the television series Pie in the Sky (1994–97). His more recent television credits include Henry V (BBC2), Silk (BBC 1) and Parade’s End (HBO/BBC). His film appearances include A Belfast Story (directed by Nathan Todd), The Young Victoria (directed by Jean-Marc Vallée) and Casino Royale (directed by Martin Campbell).

MALCOLM SINCLAIRVoice (Julius Fučík)

Omar Ebrahim became a chorister at Coventry Cathedral in 1964 and subsequently studied singing at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama. He served his performing apprenticeship at the Royal Shakespeare Company and in the

Glyndebourne chorus, performing the role of Schaunard in La bohème for Glyndebourne Touring Opera.

He has been associated with many new music projects including Nigel Osborne’s The Electrification of the Soviet Union and Birtwistle’s The Second Mrs Kong for Glyndebourne Festival Opera; and Berio’s Un re in ascolto and Birtwistle’s Gawain for the Royal Opera House. He appeared in Liza Lim’s opera The Navigator at festivals in Brisbane and Melbourne, and gave first performances of Enno Poppe’s concert and opera collaborations with Marcel Beyer – Interzone, Arbeit Nahrung Wohnung and IQ – at the Berlin Festival, the Munich Biennale and Schwetzingen.

In exploring the connection between spoken word and song, he has helped recreate the soundworlds of Frank Zappa (The Adventures of Greggery Peccary with Ensemble Modern) and Blade Runner with the Heritage Orchestra. Other text-led projects include Morton Feldman’s Words and Music and Frank O’Hara songs with the Ensemble Recherche, and King Gesar by Peter Lieberson for the Munich Biennale. Closely associated with Ligeti’s Aventures et Nouvelles Aventures, he has performed the piece to critical acclaim with ensembles worldwide including Pierre Boulez and the Ensemble Intercontemporain, and Esa-Pekka Salonen and the Los Angeles Philharmonic. He has performed and recorded In the Penal Colony by Philip Glass, Michael Nyman’s Facing Goya, Kris Defoort’s House of the Sleeping Beauties and John Harle’s The Ballad of Jamie Allan.

As an actor he has performed Schoenberg’s Ode to Napoleon Bonaparte at the Salzburg Festival, and Strauss’s melodrama on Tennyson’s Enoch Arden for IRCAM in Paris, as well as Schoenberg’s A Survivor from Warsaw and Henze’s The Raft of the Medusa with the BBC Symphony Orchestra.

OMAR EBRAhIMFučík (Julius Fučík)


John B. Read was consultant lighting designer to the Royal Opera, the Royal Ballet and Birmingham Royal Ballet from 1992 to 2005. He is largely responsible for establishing lighting as an integral part of dance presentation.

He has worked with major choreographers worldwide, notably Sir Frederick Ashton, Sir Kenneth MacMillan, Anthony Tudor, Glen Tetley, Jerome Robbins, Rudolf Nureyev, Anthony Dowell, David Bintley, Natalia Makarova, Christopher Bruce, Wayne Eagling and Ashley Page.

Works for the Royal Ballet include Swan Lake, The Nutcracker, The Snow Queen, Mayerling, Anastasia, Frankenstein, La Bayadère and The Prince of the Pagodas. He has also lit contemporary dance for the Rambert Dance Company, London Contemporary Dance Theatre and Scottish Ballet. His West End work includes On Your Toes with Natalia Makarova, The Mystery of Edwin Drood with Ernie Wise, Elaine Paige’s Romance and the Stage and Ibsen’s Ghosts. He made his debut at the Royal National Theatre in 1991 with Stephen Berkoff’s The Trial (Kafka).

His opera credits include Götz Friedrich’s production of the Ring Cycle; Andreas Schaaf’s Don Giovanni and The Marriage of Figaro; Colin Graham’s Death in Venice (also at the Met, New York) and Madame Butterfly (also in Seville); A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Anna Bolena, Tosca, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg and La Cenerentola, all at the Royal Opera House; Aïda for the English National Opera; and many productions for the English Music Theatre and Opera Groups.

Recently he has lit The Rite of Spring with L’après-midi d’un faune (English National Ballet 2012); Marguerite et Armand (La Scala, Milan) and L’histoire de Manon (Opéra/Ballet National de Paris), as well as revivals in Tokyo, New York, San Francisco, Prague, Munich, Vienna and Budapest. Kenneth MacMillan’s Romeo and Juliet was performed at The O2 in June 2011, newly lit by John B. Read.

JOhN B. READLighting designer

Annabel Arden’s distinguished career encompasses opera, theatre and broadcasting as well as acting and devising new work.

She graduated from Cambridge University and then trained

with Lecoq in Paris. In 1983 she was a co-founder of the renowned Théâtre de Complicité. Her award-winning production of Dürrenmatt’s The Visit was Complicité’s first existing-text production and established the company’s relationship with the National Theatre. She later played in The Street of Crocodiles, which toured the world.

Annabel’s landmark production for Complicité of The Winter’s Tale led to The Magic Flute for Opera North, followed by The Return of Ulysses, La traviata and The Cunning Little Vixen. She made her English National Opera debut directing The Rake’s Progress. In 2004 she directed Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi and Rachmaninoff’s The Miserly Knight at Glyndebourne, followed by the much-revived and toured L’elisir d’amore. George Aperghis’s Little Red Riding Hood was seen at the Almeida Theatre in 2005.

Annabel’s production of Beethoven’s Leonore toured to Salzburg, New York and London in 1996. She has directed Faust in Lucerne; Der Zwerg in Florence and Turin; and L’elisir d’amore in Houston. She recently directed a concert performance of The Soldier’s Tale with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and earlier this year directed La bohème for Welsh National Opera.

Her theatre productions have included plays at the National Theatre, the Arcola and the Royal Court, as well as for BBC radio. She directed Interruptions for the University of California and The Art of War for the Sydney Theatre Company.

In November 2009, Annabel directed productions of two Schittke works with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Vladimir Jurowski as part of the Orchestra’s ‘Between Two Worlds’ festival: excerpts from the opera The History of D. Johann Faustus, and The Yellow Sound.

ANNABEL ARDENDirector


Annalisa Terranova is currently in the second year of an MA course in Performance Design and Practice at Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design.

She has a degree in stage design from the Academy of Fine Arts

in Palermo, Italy, and is developing her own practice creating a series of video interactive installations.

Annalisa designed the video projections for tonight’s concert (and more extensively for the concert on 1 December) as part of a collaboration between Central Saint Martins and the London Philharmonic Orchestra.

Pieter Hugo was born in 1976 in Johannesburg and lives in Cape Town.

In 2012 a survey show, This Must Be the Place, opened at the Fotomuseum Den Haag, The Netherlands,

and travelled to the Musée de l’Elysée, Lausanne, Switzerland. Recent solo shows have also taken place at MAXXI – National Museum of 21st Century Arts, Rome (2011); Te Tuhi Centre for the Arts, Auckland (2011); the Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane, Australia (2010); Photographic Centre Peri, Turku, Finland (2010); Le Chateau d’Eau, Toulouse, France (2010); the Australian Centre for Photography, Sydney (2009); Tinglado 2, Tarragona, Spain (2009); and Foam Photography Museum, Amsterdam (2008).

Recent group exhibitions include Africa, There and Back at the Folkwang Museum, Essen, Germany (2012); FotoTriennale.dk in Funen, Denmark (2012); ARS 11, Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki (2011); Figures and Fictions: Contemporary South African Photography, V&A Museum, London (2011); and The Global Contemporary: Art Worlds after 1989 at ZKM Center for Art and Media, Karlsruhe (2011).

Hugo was the Standard Bank Young Artist for Visual Art in 2007, and the winner of the KLM Paul Huf Award and the Arles Discovery Award at the Rencontres d’Arles Photography Festival, France, in 2008. He won the Seydou Keita Award at the 9th Rencontres de Bamako African Photography Biennial, Mali, in 2011, and was shortlisted for the Deutsche Börse Photography Prize in 2012.

pIETER hUGOPhotographer

ANNALISA TERRANOVAVideo designer

A note from the director

Both Vladimir Jurowski and I thought we would like to use this opportunity to create an imaginative response to Luigi Nono's Julius Fučik in tonight’s concert and Bernd Alois Zimmermann’s Ecclesiastical Action on 1 December, rather than simply to use surtitles.

I was inspired by the humanity and uncompromisingly harsh gaze of Pieter Hugo's photographic work, and it speaks to me of Mankind's condition as expressed by the Grand Inquisitor (from Dostoyevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, used in Zimmermann’s Ecclesiastical Action, 1 December). The images are deliberately made enigmatic, so as to capture the atmosphere – both timeless, and yet very modern – of the Zimmermann work. I showed the photographs (which Pieter Hugo was generous enough to let us use) to Annalisa Terranova, a young video artist from Italy with a strong interest in contemporary music and performance. Together we have integrated text and image to accompany these two works.

Annabel Arden, November 2012


Gentlemen of the

LONDON phILhARMONIC ChOIR

Founded in 1947, the London Philharmonic Choir is widely regarded as one of Britain’s finest choirs, consistently meeting with great critical acclaim. It has performed under leading international conductors throughout the last 65 years and made numerous recordings for CD, radio and television.

Enjoying a close relationship with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, the Choir frequently joins it for concerts in the UK and abroad. In 2011/12, engagements included Scriabin’s Prometheus, Poem of Fire, Rossini’s Stabat Mater, Prokofiev’s Ivan the Terrible, Bruckner’s Te Deum, Szymanowski’s Symphony No. 3, Zemlinsky’s Psalm 23, Delius’s Sea Drift and Suk’s Ripening. This season, concerts with the LPO have included Rachmaninoff’s The Bells and Haydn’s Nelson Mass, and future engagements include Brahms’s Ein deutsches Requiem, Elgar’s The Dream of Gerontius, Stravinsky’s Symphony of Psalms, Orff’s Carmina Burana, and Tippett’s A Child of our Time.

Recently released CDs with the London Philharmonic Orchestra include Brahms’s Ein deutsches Requiem with Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Holst’s The Planets, Mahler’s Symphony No. 2, Haydn’s The Seven Last Words of our Saviour on the Cross and Honegger’s Une Cantate de Noël under Vladimir Jurowski, and Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis with Christoph Eschenbach.

The Choir appears regularly at the BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall, and performances have included the UK premières of Mark-Anthony Turnage’s A Relic of Memory and Goldie’s Sine Tempore in the Evolution!

pATRON HRH Princess Alexandra | pRESIDENT Sir Roger Norrington | ARTISTIC DIRECTOR Neville Creed ACCOMpANIST Jonathan Beatty | ChAIRMAN Mary Moore | ChOIR MANAGER Kevin Darnell

Tenors Scott Addison, Geir Andreassen, Christopher Beynon, Kevin Darnell, Aloysius Fekete, Fred Fisher, Robert Geary, Iain Handyside, Stephen Hodges, Geoff Hodgkins, Jesse Hollister, Rob Home, Michael Hope, Patrick Hughes, Andrew Mackie, Tony Masters, Rhydian Peters, Luke Phillips, Stephen Pritchard, Owen Toller, Tony Wren Basses John Bandy, Gordon Buky-Webster, Adam Bunzl, Andrei Caracoti, Geoff Clare, David Clark, Rob Collis, Marcus Daniels, Ian Frost, Paul Gittens. Nigel Grieve, Reeda Harris, Mark Hillier, Stephen Hines, David Hodgson, Martin Hudson, Steve Kirby, Richard Miller, John D Morris, John G Morris, Ashley Morrison, Robert Northcott, William Parsons, Johan Pieters, John Salmon, Ed Smith, Daniel Snowman, Peter Sollich, Peter Taylor, Alex Thomas, James Torniainen, Matthew Ward, Hin Yan Wong, John Wood

Prom. The Choir performed at the Doctor Who Proms in 2008 and 2010, and last year appeared in Verdi’s Requiem, Liszt’s A Faust Symphony and Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis. This season it performed Elgar’s The Apostles with Sir Mark Elder and Howells’s Hymnus Paradisi under Martyn Brabbins.

The Choir has visited numerous European countries and performed in Kuala Lumpur, Hong Kong and Perth, Australia. The Choir also works with other leading orchestras, and in June joined forces with the London Symphony Orchestra and Chorus to perform Berlioz’s Grande Messe des Morts with Sir Colin Davis at St Paul’s Cathedral. The Choir also sings in Raymond Gubbay’s Classical Spectacular and Christmas concerts, and has appeared in gala concerts with Russell Watson and Katherine Jenkins.

The Choir prides itself on achieving first-class performances from its members, who are volunteers from all walks of life. For more information, including details about how to join, please visit www.lpc.org.uk

© G

reen

Egg

Ltd


Beethoven wrote only one opera. Vestas Feuer, the stage work he had planned with Emanuel Schikaneder (the librettist of The Magic Flute), was abandoned in favour of work on the ‘Eroica’ Symphony. But there was also a more pertinent libretto on offer, based on French revolutionary Jean-Nicolas Bouilly’s play Léonore, ou L’amour conjugal. Beethoven’s resulting opera Fidelio tells the tale of Leonore who, disguised as a boy called Fidelio, rescues her husband from prison. Some have seen Florestan’s incarceration as an allegory for Beethoven’s deafness, while others have found in Leonore’s selfless resolve the progressive spirit of the age. Even when pondering that the prisoner might not be her husband, Leonore persists: ‘I will loose your chains whoever you are, unhappy man, by God I will save you and set you free.’

When the opera was first performed in Vienna in 1805, four days after Napoleon’s troops entered the city, Fidelio had a different overture. The piece that opens tonight’s concert was probably written for an 1807 production of the opera in Prague. Its radiant E major tonality – the polar opposite of the prison’s predominant key of

B-flat major – speaks of hoped-for liberation. On the surface, Beethoven’s sole opera belonged to a Viennese tradition of domestic comedies and heroic melodramas, but its philosophical ambitions were much greater, communicated in this grand but spirited prelude.

pROGRAMME NOTES

True idealism is all too rare. In our world bombarded by fundamentalism and factionalism, we often view the idealist as a crackpot. Throughout history, however, defiance has inspired: the lone man in front of a tank in Tiananmen Square, or a rare glimmer of compassion in the darkest corners of the Third Reich. It was that type of resilient spirit that Beethoven’s

music hoped to echo at the beginning of the 19th century. In turn he provided a blueprint for generations to come. Despite increasingly bleak socio-political circumstances, both Arnold Schoenberg and his son-in-law Luigi Nono sought to tap that zeal in telling their own stories of those who stood up to horror or who dared to dream.

Introduction

Overture, FidelioLudwig vanBeethoven

1770–1827


The text begins on the opposite page.

Through their use of classical forms and intricate development of musical motifs, Schoenberg’s pioneering 20th-century scores refer back to the music of the past. It is little wonder that Schoenberg and his pupils have come to be known as the ‘Second Viennese School’, referring to the example they had been set by Mozart, Haydn and Beethoven.

One of Schoenberg’s clearest invocations of that previous era was written after he had been forced out of Europe. By the mid 1930s, the Nazis’ cultural proscriptions had made life impossible for Jewish composers working in German-speaking Europe. Schoenberg was thrown out of his teaching post at the Akademie der Künste in Berlin and, slowly but surely, his work and that of his pupils was labelled ‘cultural Bolshevism’.

Schoenberg was intransigent. Staring down the metaphorical barrel of the Nazis’ racial and cultural gun, he converted back to Judaism in July 1933. Staying in Europe, however, spelled doom and he had to leave for America, first to a job in Boston and then to the University of Southern California in September 1934. When war eventually broke out, some Americans, though not the émigrés and refugees, were unconcerned with what was occurring in Europe. Following the Japanese attacks on Pearl Harbor, things changed.

In March 1942, three months after the bombardment, Schoenberg received a commission to write a new piece for the 20th anniversary of the League of Composers. He chose to set Lord Byron’s Ode to Napoleon, a poetic catalogue of exploiters in history. The poem includes a sole praiseworthy stanza about George Washington, yet Schoenberg’s attraction to the text was its parallels

with the unfolding situation. Hitler was destined to join Byron’s list of despotic leaders, which notably includes Napoleon, to whom Beethoven had initially dedicated his Third Symphony (a tribute he later rescinded). Although Schoenberg’s dramatic setting for narrator, piano and string orchestra is resolutely atonal, it clings to the wreckage of E-flat major (the predominant key of Beethoven’s ‘Eroica’).

Ode to Napoleon Bonaparte, Op. 41

Robert hayward narratorCatherine Edwards piano

Arnold Schoenberg

1874–1951

pROGRAMME NOTES


‘Tis done – but yesterday a King!And arm’d with Kings to strive –And now thou art a nameless thing:So abject – yet alive!Is this the man of thousand thrones,Who strew’d our earth with hostile bones,And can he thus survive?Since he, miscalled the Morning Star,Nor man nor fiend hath fallen so far.

Ill-minded man, why scourge thy kindWho bow’d so low the knee?By gazing on thyself grown blind,Thou taught’st the rest to see.With might unquestion’d, – power to save, –Thine only gift hath been the graveTo those that worshipped thee;Nor till thy fall could mortals guessAmbition’s less than littleness!

Thanks for that lesson – it will teachTo after-warriors moreThan high Philosophy can preach,And vainly preach’d before.That spell upon the minds of menBreaks never to unite again,That led them to adoreThose Pagod things of sabre sway,With fronts of brass, and feet of clay.

The triumph, and the vanity,The rapture of the strife –The earthquake voice of Victory,To thee the breath of life;The sword, the sceptre, and that swayWhich man seem’d made but to obeyWherewith renown was rife –All quell’d! – Dark spirit! what must beThe madness of they memory!

The Desolator desolate!The Victor overthrown!The Arbiter of others’ fateA Supplicant for his own!Is it some yet imperial hopeThat with such change can calmly cope?Or dread of death alone?To die a prince – or live a slave –Thy choice is most ignobly brave!

He who of old would rend the oak,Dream’d not of the rebound;Chain’d by the trunk he vainly broke –Alone – how look’d he round?Thou in the sternness of thy strengthAn equal deed hast done at length,And darker fate hast found:He fell, the forest prowler’s prey;But thou must eat thy heart away!

The Roman, when his burning heartWas slaked with blood of Rome,Threw down the dagger – dared depart,In savage grandeur, home. –He dared depart in utter scornOf men that such a yoke had borne,Yet left him such a doom!His only glory was that hourOf self-upheld abandon’d power.

The Spaniard, when the lust of swayHad lost its quickening spell,Cast crowns for rosaries away,And empire for a cell;A strict accountant of his beads,A subtle disputant on creeds,His dotage trifled well:Yet letter had he neither knownA bigot’s shrine, nor despot’s throne.

But thou – from thy reluctant handThe thunderbolt is wrung –Too late thou leav’st the high commandTo which thy weakness clung;All Evil Spirit as thou art,It is enough to grieve the heartTo see thine own unstrung;To think that God’s fair world hath beenThe footstool of a thing so mean;

And Earth hath spilt her blood for him,Who thus can hoard his own!And Monarchs bowed the trembling limb,And thank’d him for a throne!Fair Freedom! we may hold thee dear,When thus thy mightiest foes their fearIn humblest guise have shown.Oh! ne’er may tyrant leave behindA brighter name to lure mankind!

Continued overleaf

Schoenberg: Ode to Napoleon Bonaparte


Thine evil deeds are writ in gore,Not written thus in vain –Thy triumphs tell of fame no moreOr deepen every stain:If thou hadst died as honour dies,Some new Napoleon might arise,To shame the world again –But who would soar the solar height,To set in such a starless night?

Weigh’d in the balance, hero dustIs vile as vulgar clay;Thy scales, Mortality! are justTo all that pass away:But yet methought the living greatSome higher sparks should animate,To dazzle and dismay:Nor deem’d Contempt could thus make mirthOf these, the Conquerors of the earth.

And she, proud Austria’s mournful flower,Thy still imperial bride;How bears her breast the torturing hour?Still clings she to thy side?Must she too bend, must she too shareThy late repentance, long despair,Thou throneless Homicide?If still she loves thee, hoard that gem,‘Tis worth thy vanish’d diadem!

Then haste thee to they sullen Isle, And gaze upon the sea;That element may meet thy smile –It ne’er was ruled by thee!Or trace with thine all idle handIn loitering mood upon the sandThat Earth is now as free!That Corinth’s pedagogue hath nowTransferr’d his by-word to thy brow.

Thou Timour! in his captive’s cageWhat thoughts will there be thine,While brooding in thy prison’d rage?But one – ‘The world was mine!’Unless, like he of Babylon,All sense is with thy sceptre gone,Life will not long confineThat spirit pour’d so widely forth –So long obey’d – so little worth!

Or, like the thief of fire from heaven,Wilt thou withstand the shock?And share with him, the unforgiven,His vulture and his rock!Foredoom’d by God – by man accurst,And that last act, though not thy worst,The very Fiend’s arch mock;He in his fall preserved his pride,And, if a mortal, had as proudly died!

There was a day – there was an hour,While earth was Gaul’s – Gaul thine –When that immeasurable powerUnsated to resignHad been an act of purer fameThan gathers round Marengo’s nameAnd gilded thy decline,Through the long twilight of all time,Despite some passing clouds of crime.

But thou forsooth must be a king,And don the purple vest, – As if that foolish robe could wringRemembrance from thy breast.Where is that faded garment? whereThe gewgaws thou wert fond to wear,The star – the string – the crest?Vain froward child of empire! say,Are all thy playthings snatch’d away?

Where may the wearied eye reposeWhen gazing on the Great;Where neither guilty glory glows,Nor despicable state?Yes – one – the first – the last – the bestThe Cincinnatus of the West,Whom envy dared not hate,Bequeath’d the name of Washington,To make man blush there was but one!

Lord Byron (1788–1824)

Ode To Napoleon Bonaparte, Opus 41 Words by George Byron Music by Albert Schoenberg© Copyright 1942 G Schirmer Inc. All Rights Reserved. International Copyright Secured. Used by permission.


After his powerful indictment of the abuses of power in the Ode to Napoleon Bonaparte, Schoenberg offered a more inspiring example of humanity in his 1947 work A Survivor from Warsaw. The implicit warning couched in Schoenberg’s Ode had sadly come all too true and Hitler and his party had wreaked unspeakable catastrophes across Europe. In July 1947, the Koussevitzky Foundation approached Schoenberg about writing a new piece. Returning to an idea to honour the victims of the Holocaust that he had first discussed with the dancer Corinne Chochem, Schoenberg created an original text about the Warsaw Ghetto. Beaten ferociously, the captives begin to sing the Hebrew prayer ‘Sh’ma Yisroel’, insistent on their own dignity in the face of death. Schoenberg described what he had hoped to communicate:

It means at first a warning to all Jews, never to forget what has been done to us, never to forget that even people who did not do it themselves, agreed with them and many of them found it necessary to treat us this way. We should never forget this.

The memories of the imagined survivor are communicated through a vivid juxtaposition of narration and accompaniment – a hellish brand of the melodrama that Schoenberg had employed at the end of Gurrelieder, throughout Pierrot Lunaire and in the Ode to Napoleon Bonaparte. Against this desperate account, Schoenberg describes the militaristic world of the Nazis in a series of brass salvos, returning time and time again like a ghastly ritornello. Only Schoenberg’s original melody for the ‘Sh’ma Yisroel’ pierces this violent soundworld, offering hope in the midst of the nightmare.

pROGRAMME NOTES

Arnold Schoenberg

1874–1951

A Survivor from Warsaw, Op. 46

Robert hayward narratorGentlemen of the London philharmonic Choir

INTERVAL – 20 minutesAn announcement will be made five minutes before the end of the interval.

The text is overleaf.


Narrator I cannot remember ev’rything.I must have been unconscious most of the time. I remember only the grandiose moment when they all started to sing as if prearranged, the old prayer they had neglected for so many years – the forgotten creed!

But I have no recollection how I got underground to live in the sewers of Warsaw for so long a time.

The day began as usual: Reveille when it still was dark. ‘Get out!’ Whether you slept or whether worries kept you awake the whole night. You had been separated from your children, from your wife, from your parents; You don’t know what happened to them, how could you sleep?

The trumpets again – ‘Get out! The sergeant will be furious!’ They came out; some very slow: the old ones, the sick ones; some with nervous agility. They fear the sergeant. They hurry as much as they can.

In vain! Much too much noise; much too much commotion – and not fast enough! The Feldwebel shouts: ‘Achtung! Stilljestanden! Na wird’s mal? Oder soll ich mit dem Jewehrkolben nachhelfen? Na jutt; wenn ihrs durchaus haben wollt!’[‘Attention! Stand still! How about it, or should I help you along with the butt of my rifle? Oh well, if you really want to have it!’]

The sergeant and his subordinates hit everybody: young or old, quiet or nervous, guilty or innocent. It was painful to hear them groaning and moaning.

I heard it though I had been hit very hard, so hard that I could not help falling down. We all on the ground who could not stand up were then beaten over the head.

I must have been unconscious. The next thing I knew was a soldier saying: ‘They are all dead’, whereupon the sergeant ordered to do away with us.

There I lay aside half conscious. It had become very still – fear and pain.

Then I heard the sergeant shouting: ‘Abzählen!’ [‘Count off!’]They started slowly and irregularly: one, two, three, four ‘Achtung!’ the sergeant shouted again, ‘Rascher! Nochmal von vorn anfangen! In einer Minute will ich wissen, wieviele ich zur Gaskammer abliefere! Abzählen!’

[‘Faster! Once more, start from the beginning! In one minute I want to know how many I am going to send off to the gas chamber! Count off!’]

They began again, first slowly: one, two, three, four, became faster and faster, so fast that it finally sounded like a stampede of wild horses, and all of a sudden, in the middle of it, they began singing the Sh’ma Yisroel.

Chorus Sh’ma Yisroel, Adonoy elohenoo, Adonoy echod.Veohavto es Adonoy elohecho bechol levovecho, oovechol nafshecho, oovechol meodecho.Vehoyoo haddevoreem hoeleh asher onochee metsavvecho hayyom al levovecho.Veshinnantom levonecho, vedibbartobom beshivtecho bevetecho, oovelechtecho badderech, ooveshochbecho oovekoomecho.

Hear O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is one.And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.And these words which I command thee this day shall be upon thy heart.And thou shalt teach them diligently to thy children, speaking of them when thou sittest in thy house and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down and when thou risest up.(Deuteronomy 6:4–7)

Text by Arnold Schoenberg. © Copyright 1949 by Bomart Music Publications, Inc.; © Copyright assigned 1955 to Boelke-Bomart, Inc.; Revised Edition © 1979 by Boelke-Bomart, Inc.; © Copyright assigned 2011 to Schott Music GmbH & Co. KG.

Schoenberg: A Survivor from Warsaw


pROGRAMME NOTES

Julius Fučík was a leading Czechoslovak journalist. He was imprisoned by the Nazis in Prague’s Pankrác Prison for his involvement in the Czech Communist Party. While there, unbeknownst to his captors, he wrote Notes from the Gallows. Rather than lamenting his situation, Fučík’s memoir looks forward to a brighter future. Sadly, the Nazis executed him in 1943, but two sympathetic Czech guards had already smuggled out the papers on which Fučík had written his optimistic text. His wife retrieved them after the war and published the book in 1947. It was subsequently translated into 90 different languages and, since 1958, the International Day of Journalists’ Solidarity has been held on 8 September, the anniversary of Fučík’s death.

In 1951, Arnold Schoenberg’s son-in-law Luigi Nono embarked on a new musical project. It was to be a two-part celebration of Julius Fučík’s resilience and gallantry in the face of Nazi aggression. Nono only completed the first section of his piece, but he returned to Fučík’s Notes from the Gallows for one of the sources of his operatic project Intolleranza 1960. It was not until 16 years after Nono’s death that his original Julius Fučík piece was heard. Premiered at the 2006 Munich Festival, Nono’s work instantly revealed parallels with Schoenberg’s narrated pieces. But, within the context of this programme, Nono looks even further back, through Schoenberg, to Beethoven. For it was his music to which Fučík would cling in prison:

Winter prepares man for its rigours as it prepares a tree. Believe me, this has taken nothing, absolutely nothing, from the joy that is in me and that heralds itself each day with some Beethoven theme or

other. Man does not become smaller even when he becomes shorter by a head. And my ardent wish is that when all is over you will remember me not with sorrow, but with precisely that joy with which I always lived.

As the hostile bark of the prison guards abates and Fučík is left alone in his thoughts, Nono’s broken melodies hang suspended in the air. Of Schoenberg’s A Survivor from Warsaw, Nono had written that, ‘This masterpiece is, due to the creative necessity of the relationships between the text and the music, and the music and the listener, the aesthetic and musical manifesto of our epoch.’ Julius Fučík pays a clear debt to Nono’s father-in-law’s masterpiece, while conjuring its own synergy of word and sound.

Julius Fučík (UK premiere)

Omar Ebrahim Fučík Malcolm Sinclair Voice

Luigi Nono

1924–90

The text is overleaf.

Please note that the Beethoven will follow the Nono without a break or applause.


Voice:Hands up!Walk!What is your name?And your address is?Speak now!With whom are you in contact?Speak now! Speak now!Feeling better Mr Journalist?You see, I know it all anyway.Speak now!Tie him up; and beat him again!

Fučík:So my death, despite all, has not yet come.I’m living in a nightmare.And they beat me, throw water at meAnd then more beatings, again and again.

Voice:Speak now! Speak now! Speak now!

Fučík:From far, far away, I hear a voiceA voice like a caress

Voice:He has had enough

Fučík:My consciousness flows away like blood from a profound wound.It took you so long to get here, Death.And up until now I had hoped to have met You much later,After long years,I had hoped to be able to live my life as a free man,To live a life filled with work and filled with love.And I have loved life for all its beauty;And I loved You, MankindAnd was happy when I felt You returned my loveAnd I suffered when You did not understand me.Let sadness not be linked to my name.This is my last will and testamentFor you father, mother, sisters, for you my Gusta,For you my comrades,

For all of you I have loved:Don’t mourn for me.I lived only for joyAnd now for joy I die.Don’t mourn for me

From Reportáž psaná na oprátce (‘Notes from the Gallows’ ) by Julius Fučík (1903–43). English translation by Rosalba Lo Duca and Annabel Arden.

Fučík: Winter prepares man for its rigours as it prepares a tree. Believe me, this has taken nothing, absolutely nothing, from the joy that is in me and that heralds itself each day with some Beethoven theme or other. Man does not become smaller even when he becomes shorter by a head. And my ardent wish is that when all is over you will remember me not with sorrow, but with precisely that joy with which I always lived.

Please note that the Beethoven will follow the Nono without a break and you are requested not to applaud until the end of the Symphony.

Nono: Julius Fučík

Julius Fučík in 1939 © RIA Novosti / Alamy


Symphony No. 5 in C minor, Op. 67

1 Allegro con brio2 Andante con moto3 Scherzo. Allegro – 4 Allegro

Ludwig vanBeethoven

1770–1827

No doubt one of the Beethoven works forefront in Julius Fučík’s mind was the composer’s Fifth Symphony. Beethoven had been planning a symphony in C minor since the completion of the ‘Eroica’, and eventually got to the project in 1807. The symphony was premiered in Vienna at the end of 1808 in a concert that included the Sixth Symphony, the Fourth Piano Concerto (with Beethoven at the keyboard), the Choral Fantasy and several excerpts and smaller works. This highly ambitious programme proved too taxing even for the redoubtably energetic Beethoven. Planned as a fillip to his precarious finances, it is unlikely that the concert, staged on a bitterly cold day and palpably lacking in rehearsals, reaped those rewards. But despite its far from perfect launch, Beethoven’s C minor Symphony, propelled into the world on 22 December 1808, changed the face of music forever.

The opening Allegro begins with a decisive four-note gesture. The ensuing 35-minute symphonic narrative derives its entire motivic and harmonic power from this distinctive cell. At first it generates an exchange between the various sections of the orchestra in the exposition, amassing to bold attacks. The second subject is contrastingly lyrical and in the relative major, but that initial gesture is tenacious. It makes its presence felt in an introductory horn call – of which the second subject is a variant – and again in subsequent rhythmic manifestations. Beethoven hints at later glories in the climactic passages of the second subject, but they are impeded by the return of that primary cell. The development section brooks no interference and, although briefly lagging in energy, the initial motif drives on through to the recapitulation. An oboe sounds a lone appeal in the midst of the fracas, but even more audacious rounds of that central idea erase its plangent call. When the second subject returns, it is cast in C

major. That is the Symphony’s ultimate goal, but the principles of sonata form dictate that glory must be denied and C minor returns, underpinned by ferocious timpani.

The succeeding Andante seems to move away from the battleground of the first movement. A polite dialogue with dotted rhythms in the strings and more nostalgic woodwind tees up a chain of cadences. But, as in the first movement, these patterns are underlined by the Symphony’s motivic kernel. Its four-note tap will not be silenced, and it trumps the new established tonic of A-flat major with a burst of C major. Although the opening legato phrases recur, they cannot placate underlying tensions, which then bubble to the surface in the following Allegro.

Here, the four-note motif drives through the various textures with fierce intent, and Beethoven has returned to C minor. Ranging over a diverse harmonic landscape – in B-flat minor and then brief but energetic passages in the dominant and subdominant – the music pines for resolution. Throwing us off the scent, bassoons, oboes and pizzicato strings deliver the motif in comically eerie tones. But this is a bluff, a trembling preparation for the final ascent. Shifting to a dominant pedal, Beethoven releases his finale.

The triumph of C major over C minor is now stated outright in a last brave Allegro. The entire orchestra joins in with the theme, turning the central motif’s descending gesture on its head. Here it is drawn into the main rising theme and the pre-emptive strike of the second subject. But rather than mooring the finale to the Symphony’s origins, glory is never in doubt. Everything overcomes that dark initial key, which E.T.A. Hoffmann described as the ‘radiant beams [that]

pROGRAMME NOTES


shoot through this region’s deep night’. A century later, in Howards End, E.M. Forster told of ‘the gusts of splendour, the heroism, the youth, the magnificence of life and of death and, amid vast roarings of superhuman joy, he led his Fifth Symphony to its conclusion.’

This Symphony’s ecstatic defiance provided a model for subsequent generations. Brahms, Tchaikovsky, Sibelius, Mahler and Shostakovich, to name but a handful, wrote symphonic works that tried to harness Beethoven’s idealism to their own means. Through the resolutely abstract triumph of major over minor, Beethoven had communicated an idealism with which people, regardless of race, colour or creed, could not fail to identify.

Programme notes © Gavin Plumley

NExT LpO CONCERT AT ROYAL FESTIVAL hALL

Saturday 1 December 2012 | 7.30pm

*Zimmermann Ecclesiastical ActionBrahms A German Requiem

Vladimir Jurowski conductor Miah persson sopranoDietrich henschel baritoneOmar Ebrahim Speaker 1*Malcolm Sinclair Speaker 2*Annabel Arden director*London philharmonic Choir

Booking details

London philharmonic Orchestra Ticket Office (no transaction fee) 020 7840 4242 Monday to Friday 10.00am–5.00pm | lpo.org.uk

Southbank Centre Ticket Office (transaction fees apply) 0844 847 9920 Daily 9.00am–8.00pm | southbankcentre.co.uk

pROGRAMME NOTES

Free pre-concert performance The Clore Ballroom, Royal Festival hall The Orchestra’s creative ensemble for 15–19 year olds, The Band, perform their own new music inspired by Zimmerman’s Ecclesiastical Action. Free Barlines post-concert discussion The Clore Ballroom, Royal Festival hall Artists involved in the performance will discuss the evening’s programme.


London philharmonic OrchestraBirthday Appeal 2012/13

Two double bass stoolsOur double bass stools are on their last legs. Support our musicians by giving them something new to sit on!

Three tom-tomsWe often have to hire percussion. Owning our own tom-toms would make a great birthday present!

Carmina Burana music hireDonate towards the score and part hire for the conductor, Orchestra and London Philharmonic Choir for the performance of Orff’s Carmina Burana on 6 April 2013.

FUNharmonics illustrationsDonate to the bespoke illustrations and animation designed for each themed FUNharmonics family concert, to help educate and increase engagement with our young audiences.

Recording a concert for live streamHelp us to increase the Orchestra’s reach around the world through donating to the recording of a 2013 concert for live stream and potential CD release.

New terminal serverThe socks option – sounds boring but we really need it! The terminal server keeps our staff and backstage team in touch by providing remote access to emails and files when the Orchestra is on tour.

£250£800 £1,500

£5,000£3,000

This season the London Philharmonic Orchestra has reached 80 years on the concert platform. We would like you to consider helping us celebrate by making a donation to our birthday wish list.

These presents are all items that the Orchestra desperately needs this season. Alternatively you could make a donation to be spent on whatever we need the most.

Get involved and visit www.lpo.org.uk/birthday for more information. Alternatively get in touch via [email protected] or call 020 7840 4212.

£5,000


ADMINISTRATION

Board of Directors

Victoria Sharp ChairmanStewart McIlwham* PresidentDesmond Cecil CMG Vesselin Gellev* Jonathan Harris CBE FRICS Dr Catherine C. HøgelMartin Höhmann* Angela Kessler Gareth Newman* George Peniston* Sir Bernard RixKevin Rundell* Julian SimmondsMark Templeton*Sir Philip ThomasNatasha TsukanovaTimothy Walker AM Laurence Watt Dr Manon Williams

* Player-Director

Advisory Council

Jonathan DawsonClive Marks OBE FCALord Sharman of Redlynch OBEVictoria Sharp Timothy Walker AM

American Friends of the London philharmonic Orchestra, Inc.

Margot Astrachan ChairmanDavid E. R. Dangoor

Vice Chair/TreasurerKyung-Wha ChungPeter M. Felix CBE Alexandra JupinDr. Felisa B. KaplanWilliam A. KerrJill Fine MainelliKristina McPhee Dr. Joseph Mulvehill Harvey M. Spear, Esq.Danny Lopez

Honorary ChairmanNoel Kilkenny

Honorary DirectorVictoria Sharp

Honorary Director

Richard Gee, Esq Of CounselRobert Kuchner, CPA

General Administration

Timothy Walker AM Chief Executive and Artistic Director

Alison AtkinsonDigital Projects Manager

Finance

David BurkeGeneral Manager andFinance Director

David GreensladeFinance and IT Manager Concert Management

Roanna Gibson Concerts Director (maternity leave)

Ruth SansomArtistic Administrator / Acting Head of Concerts Department

Graham WoodConcerts and Recordings Manager

Barbara Palczynski Glyndebourne and Projects Administrator

Jenny Chadwick Tours and Engagements Manager

Alison JonesConcerts Co-ordinator

Jo OrrPA to the Chief Executive / Concerts Assistant

Matthew FreemanRecordings Consultant Education & Community

Patrick BaileyEducation and Community Director

Alexandra ClarkeEducation Manager

Caz ValeCommunity and Young Talent Manager

Richard MallettEducation and Community Producer

Orchestra personnel

Andrew CheneryOrchestra Personnel Manager

Sarah ThomasLibrarian

Michael PattisonStage Manager

Julia BoonAssistant Orchestra Personnel Manager

Ken Graham TruckingInstrument Transportation Development

Nick JackmanDevelopment Director

Helen Searl Corporate Relations Manager

Katherine HattersleyCharitable Giving Manager

Melissa Van EmdenEvents Manager

Laura LuckhurstCorporate Relations and Events Officer

Sarah FletcherDevelopment and Finance Officer Marketing

Kath TroutMarketing Director

Mia RobertsMarketing Manager

Rachel WilliamsPublications Manager

Samantha KendallBox Office Manager(Tel: 020 7840 4242)

Libby Northcote-GreenMarketing Co-ordinator

Claire LamponIntern

Albion Media Public Relations (Tel: 020 3077 4930)

Archives

Philip StuartDiscographer

Gillian PoleRecordings Archive professional Services

Charles RussellSolicitors

Crowe Clark Whitehill LLPAuditors

Dr Louise MillerHonorary Doctor

London philharmonic Orchestra89 Albert Embankment London SE1 7TPTel: 020 7840 4200Fax: 020 7840 4201Box Office: 020 7840 4242lpo.org.uk

The London Philharmonic Orchestra Limited is a registered charity No. 238045.

Photographs of Beethoven and Schoenberg courtesy of the Royal College of Music, London. Photograph of Nono © Salzburg Festival Archive. Front cover photograph © Patrick Harrison.

Printed by Cantate.


Thomas Beecham GroupThe Tsukanov Family Anonymous

The Sharp FamilyJulian & Gill Simmonds

Garf & Gill CollinsAndrew Davenport Mrs Sonja DrexlerDavid & Victoria Graham FullerMoya GreeneJohn & Angela KesslerMr & Mrs MakharinskyGeoff & Meg MannCaroline, Jamie & Zander SharpEric Tomsett

Guy & Utti Whittaker Manon Williams

principal BenefactorsMark & Elizabeth AdamsJane AttiasLady Jane BerrillDesmond & Ruth CecilMr John H CookMr Charles Dumas

David EllenCommander Vincent Evans Mr Daniel GoldsteinMr & Mrs Jeffrey HerrmannPeter MacDonald EggersMr & Mrs David MalpasAndrew T MillsMr Maxwell MorrisonMr Michael PosenMr & Mrs Thierry SciardMr John Soderquist & Mr Costas MichaelidesMr & Mrs G SteinMr & Mrs John C TuckerMr & Mrs John & Susi Underwood Lady Marina VaizeyHoward & Sheelagh WatsonMr Laurie Watt Mr Anthony Yolland

BenefactorsMrs A BeareDr & Mrs Alan Carrington CBE FRSMr & Mrs Stewart CohenMr Alistair CorbettMr David DennisMr David EdgecombeMr Richard Fernyhough

Ken FollettPauline & Peter HallidayMichael & Christine HenryMr Ivan HurryMr Glenn HurstfieldMr R K JehaMr Gerald LevinSheila Ashley LewisWg. Cdr. & Mrs M T Liddiard OBE JP RAFMr Frank LimPaul & Brigitta LockMr Brian MarshJohn Montgomery Mr & Mrs Andrew NeillEdmund PirouetMr Peter TausigMrs Kazue TurnerDes & Maggie WhitelockBill Yoe

hon. BenefactorElliott Bernerd

hon. Life MembersKenneth Goode Pehr G GyllenhammarEdmund Pirouet Mrs Jackie Rosenfeld OBE

We would like to acknowledge the generous support of the following Thomas Beecham Group patrons, principal Benefactors and Benefactors:

The generosity of our Sponsors, Corporate Members, supporters and donors is gratefully acknowledged:

Corporate Members

Silver: AREVA UKBritish American Business Hermes Fund Managers Pritchard Englefield

Bronze: Lisa Bolgar Smith and Felix

Appelbe of Ambrose AppelbeAppleyard & Trew LLPBerkeley LawCharles RussellLazardLeventis Overseas

Education partner Boeing

Corporate DonorLombard Street Research

preferred partners Corinthia Hotel Heineken Lindt & Sprüngli Ltd Villa Maria

In-kind SponsorsGoogle IncSela / Tilley’s Sweets

Trusts and FoundationsAddleshaw Goddard Charitable Trust Angus Allnatt Charitable FoundationBBC Performing Arts Fund The Boltini TrustSir William Boreman’s Foundation Britten-Pears FoundationThe Candide TrustThe Coutts Charitable TrustDiaphonique, Franco-British fund for

contemporary musicDunard FundThe Equitable Charitable TrustThe Eranda FoundationFidelio Charitable TrustThe Foyle FoundationJ Paul Getty Junior Charitable TrustThe Jeniffer and Jonathan Harris Charitable TrustCapital Radio’s Help a London ChildThe Hobson CharityThe Kirby Laing Foundation

The Idlewild TrustThe Leverhulme TrustMarsh Christian TrustAdam Mickiewicz Institute The Peter Minet TrustPaul Morgan Charitable TrustThe Diana and Allan Morgenthau

Charitable TrustMaxwell Morrison Charitable TrustMusicians Benevolent FundNewcomen Collett Foundation The Austin & Hope Pilkington Trust Serge Rachmaninoff FoundationThe Rothschild Foundation The Samuel Sebba Charitable TrustThe Bernard Sunley Charitable

FoundationJohn Thaw Foundation The Tillett TrustThe Underwood Trust Sir Siegmund Warburg’s Voluntary

SettlementKurt Weill Foundation for MusicGarfield Weston Foundation and others who wish to remain

anonymous


Doremus Deutsche Bank London Philarmonic Orchestra 301258 247x175mm Proof 04 11-01-2012

This advertisement has been approved and/or communicated by Deutsche Bank AG. This advertisement does not constitute an offer or a recommendation to enter into any transaction. The services described in this advertisement are provided by Deutsche Bank AG or by its subsidiaries and/or affiliates in accordance with appropriate local legislation and regulation. Deutsche Bank AG is authorized under German Banking Law (competent authority: BaFin – Federal Financial Supervisory Authority) and authorized and subject to limited regulation by the Financial Services Authority. Details about the extent of Deutsche Bank AG’s authorization and regulation by the Financial Services Authority are available on request. Investments are subject to investment risk, including market fluctuations, regulatory change, counterparty risk, possible delays in repayment and loss of income and principal invested. The value of investments can fall as well as rise and you might not get back the amount originally invested at any point in time. © Copyright Deutsche Bank 2012.

Deutsche Bank db.com

Deutsche Bank is committed to providing young people with access to the arts. Our free tickets scheme allows over 15,000 young people each year to attend a tailored performance by the London Philharmonic Orchestra, building musical understanding and appreciation.

Passion for Music

28 November 2012 programme notes

Documents

Transcript of 28 November 2012 programme notes