NZSO performs popular work

NZSO performs popular work Scheherazade with Peruvian conductor

Peruvian conductor Miguel Harth-Bedoya is back in New Zealand to lead the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra for a fourth time.

Last October, Harth-Bedoya wowed audiences nationwide with the NZSO’s exciting annual concert series Bold Worlds featuring solo clarinettist Kari Kriikku. In 2014, he conducted Golijov’s opera Ainadamar as part of the International New Zealand Festival of the Arts, and in 2012 he debuted with the NZSO when he conducted Symphonic Dances from Bernstein’s West Side Story and Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto with guest violinist Nicola Benedetti.

This time, he’ll conduct Rimsky-Korsakov’s fantastical Scheherazade which has remained a firm favourite since its 1888 premiere. It has been played at least 23 times by the Orchestra since its inaugural NZSO performance in July 1947.

Like several of his gifted compatriots, Rimsky-Korsakov began his musical career as an amateur but became one of the most brilliant members of the 19th century Russian school. Distilling the stories from 1001 Arabian Nights into an orchestral fantasy, he described the Scheherazade narrative as:

[To] subvert the Sultan Shahriar's vow to kill each of his wives after the first night, the Sultana Sheherazade spins an intricate web of to-be-continued tales, one per night, for 1,001 nights, ultimately fascinating and winning over the sultan.

Composed just 12 years earlier, French composer Édouard Lalo’s Cello Concerto captured a craze for Spanish exoticism sweeping through Paris at this time. Brilliant contrasts of texture and dynamics create a sense of drama throughout the work which celebrates the natural singing qualities of the cello, particularly in the middle movement.

Known for his passionate style, German-Canadian cellist Johannes Moser is an ideal choice for this performance. Hailed by Gramophone Magazine as “one of the finest amongst the astonishing gallery of young virtuoso cellists”, this will be Moser’s debut performance with the NZSO. A recipient of the prestigious 2014 Brahms prize and top prize winner at the 2002 Tchaikovsky Competition, Moser has performed with some of the world’s leading orchestras including the Berlin Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, Los Angeles Philharmonic and Hong Kong Philharmonic.

Last year, MusicWeb International’s Recording of the Year featured Moser playing Lalo’s Cello Concerto with the Prague Philharmonia and conductor Jakub Hrůša.

Moser grasps Lalo's Concerto by the scruff, delivering a performance of enormous flair and effervescence. BBC Music Magazine, 2015.

Completing the programme is Hungarian composer Zoltán Kodály’s most well-known work Dances of Galánta. While travelling from village to village with his family (his father was a station-master for the Austro-Hungarian Imperial Railroads) the budding composer absorbed the traditional folk music of his homeland, igniting a fascination to which he would dedicate his life.

Commissioned for the 80th anniversary of the Budapest Philharmonic Society in 1933, Dances of Galánta is based on folk music of Galánta (now part of Slovakia) where Kodály lived as a child. A master orchestrator, Kodály plays expertly with timbre, colour and tempo throughout the work, springing forward gingerly or pulling back so the listener can luxuriate in the rich textures of this music.

Under the baton of returning Peruvian conductor Miguel Harth-Bedoya, this exotic concert series Scheherazade will be one to treasure.

ENDS

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