Thu, 24. 10. 2019, 7.00 p.m.

B2 JIŘÍ VODIČKA & FBM

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

It was in 1945 that the English composer Benjamin Britten wrote his second opera Peter Grimes, based on George Crabbe's poem of the same name, and the work was well received by the public and the critics alike. In order to make the work available as a concert piece, Britten subsequently wrote a four-part suite ("Dawn", "Sunday Morning", "Moonlight" and "Storm") which builds a symphonic picture of the action portrayed in the stage work.

Josef Suk received considerable recognition not only for his compositions, but also as a performer. He was a highly proficient violinist so, as we might expect, much of his work was written for that instrument. His technically exquisite Fantasy in G minor written in 1902-3, though in free single-movement form, is effectively a violin concerto which really puts the soloist on his mettle. The work - at times balladic, at times dramatic - is performed tonight by Jiří Vodička, a laureate of the important New York Young Concert Artists competition.

Johannes Brahms's first symphony was a long time in the gestation, taking a long 21 years to mature into the work as we know it today. Brahms, highly self-critical to the extent that he even destroyed a whole series of his early compositions, sought in this symphony to live up to the high expectations vested in him by his friends. In the end the sensitivity of the piece showed it to be a worthy successor to Beethoven's symphonies. Unsurprisingly, the eminent pianist and conductor Hans von Bülow described the work as Beethoven's Tenth Symphony. The prominent Austrian musical critic Eduard Hanslick had no qualms about comparing it to Beethoven's Ninth, with the concluding theme of Brahms's symphony reminding him of the exalted Ode to Joy.

Tonight's programme is conducted by Robert Jindra, currently 'Erste Kapellmeister' at the Aalto–Musiktheater in Essen, Germany.