19 November 2016, 7:00 pm
The Witold Lutosławski Concert Studio, Warsaw

On 19 November, Michail Jurowski, one of Europe’s leading conductors, will perform with the Polish Orchestra Sinfonia Iuventus in the Witold Lutosławski Concert Studio. During this special concert we will listen to the music of two German masters: Ludwig van Beethoven and Richard Wagner. Irina Papenbrock will sing a solo part in Wagner’s Liebestod. Irina is an outstanding Russian mezzo-soprano, who has participated in the Bayreuth Festival at the special invitation of the Wagner Society.

Maestro Michail Jurowski has conducted the world’s famous orchestras. He has permanently cooperated with the Semperoper in Dresden, and worked as a Guest Conductor of the Komische Oper Berlin. In addition, his other functions included: the Music Director and Principal Conductor of the Nordwestdeutsche Philharmonie, the Norddeutsche Philharmonie, and the Volkstheater in Rostock, the Music Director of the Opera in Leipzig, the Permanent Guest Conductor of the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester in Berlin, Deutsche Oper in Berlin, the Principal Guest Conductor of the Tonkünstler-Orchester in Austria, as well as the Principal Conductor of the WDR Rundfunkorchester in Cologne. In 2001 he received a Grammy nomination for the recordings of orchestral music by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov. In 2012 he was awarded the third International Shostakovich Prize by the Shostakovich Gohrisch Foundation.

Maestro Jurowski is the Principal Guest Conductor of the Polish Orchestra Sinfonia Iuventus and a member of its Artistic Council.
The concert will begin with a presentation of the music by Richard Wagner, whose music dramas and operas have earned him a place in the pantheon of the greatest artists in the history of music. “The feeling for the stage, reliably-sounding instrumentation, suggestive and strong themes reinforced by vivid rather than overly refined harmony […], the harmony that stays well in our ears like the shades of human speech – these are simply the constituents of this mood that is capable of captivating our sensitivity until this day” – this is what Stefan Kisielewski wrote about Richard Wagner. Maestro Jurowski will conduct the emotion-driven Prelude to the famous music drama Tristan and Isolde (1959), which is a tale of fulfilled love and the transforming death. “Tristan as a man suing for Isolde’s hand, leads her to his master and uncle. They are in love with each other. From a shy complaint of unsatisfied desire, from the most delicate thrill to a strong outburst of tragic love, a feeling goes through all phases of hopeless fight with passion until it plunges again into faintness as if fades away to death,” says the composer. The final Liebestod will be a romantic addition to the introduction.

The Siegfried Idyll is a work composed for a special occasion which dates back to 1870. Wagner composed the Siegfried Idyll to mark the birthday of his son Siegfried. It was meant to honour his wife, and was first performed early morning under her window as a surprise present. The lyrical work was based on the theme of Acts 2 and 3 of Siegfried, or the third part of the Ring of the Nibelung.

The second part of the evening will feature a programme work by Ludwig van Beethoven – Symphony No. 6 in F major “The Pastoral”. The composer marked the five-part work with the following comment: “more the expression of feeling than painting”. The representation of an idyllic and cheerful mood and certain natural phenomena (solely with the use of instrumental means) is a prognosis of a new romantic type of programming. In this work, the composer refers to folk songs and dance, and uses illustrative elements. The second part illustrates the sounds of a cuckoo, nightingale and quail, and the fourth part – the sounds of storm. Continuous popularity of Symphony No. 6 contradicts the theory that the best symphonies by Beethoven are those with odd numbers.

Programme:
Richard Wagner – “Siegfried Idyll”, WWV 103
Richard Wagner – Prelude and Liebestod from the music drama “Tristan and Isolde”
Ludwig van Beethoven – Symphony No. 6 in F major, Op. 68, “The Pastoral”

Performers:
Irina Papenbrock – mezzo-soprano
Polish Orchestra Sinfonia Iuventus
Michail Jurowski – conductor

Tickets:
www.bilety24.pl, sklep.polskieradio.pl, 1h before the concert in the box office of the Witold Lutosławski Concert Studio.