Thu, 23. 1. 2020, 7.00 p.m.

A4 PARISIAN MOTIFS

Venue: Zlín Congress Centre  |  Organizer: Filharmonie Bohuslava Martinů, o.p.s.  | 

George Gershwin's An American in Paris, inspired by a visit he made to the French capital, is a musical depiction of the impressions of an American tourist strolling through its busy streets, taking in the constantly pulsating city's many characteristic sounds and unmistakeable atmosphere. Listeners will note that the standard instrumental complement is augmented for this piece by a score for four klaxons mimicking the honking of the city's taxi-drivers.

The beginning of the last century saw the violin concerto as a genre in Russian music fall into the doldrums, in the sense that nothing of its kind had been written for the violin that could hold a candle to the earlier pieces by Tchaikovsky and Glazunov. But this predicament came to an end with Sergey Prokofiev's first violin concerto, which was instantly acclaimed as one of the greatest Russian works of its type. This pervasively lyrical, enchanting and poetic composition is performed tonight by Milan Al–Ashhab, the winner of last year's prestigious Fritz Kreisler competition in Vienna, and one of the foremost contemporary talents of the Czech violin school. It was in early February 1899 that Edward Elgar completed his Variations on an Original Theme, which later became the Enigma Variations. The work consists of a theme in fourteen variations dedicated to the composer's friends, each one an ingenious musical characterisation of those close to him.

Wielding the baton with the Bohuslav Martinů Philharmonic in tonight's programme is the talented Permanent Guest Conductor with the Brno Philharmonic Robert Kružík.