Santtu-Matias Rouvali leads the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra in some of the greatest masterpieces of symphonic music. Sergei Rachmaninoff’s aching second piano concerto is the highlight of the evening.
Santtu-Matias Rouvali selects the best from his repertoire as the concert season comes to a close, and with it, his time as an immeasurably popular chief conductor. Longing and romance are present in Rachmaninoff’s second piano concerto. This piece is known to history for its moving melodies and virtuosic playing. Rachmaninoff himself became known as one of the best pianists of his time.
It has been 80 years since Bela Bartók died in 1945. His concerto for orchestra is among his top accomplishments, and Bartók described the music as a journey from severity, through ominous song, to a life-affirming conclusion. Here, the orchestra has an opportunity to showcase the skills of all its soloists. Each movement is full of ingenuity and a rich offering of musical influences from an entire life.
As an introduction, we hear Central European folk songs in the magnificent tone poem Haakon Jarl by Czech Bedrich Smetana. Smetana had a strong connection to Gothenburg and lived here while composing the partly true story of the Viking king who refused to accept Christianity.
Listen
Get to know the music.
Introduction to the concert
Take a seat in the Great Hall onehourbefore the concertbegins and learnmoreabout the musicyouwillsoonexperience! Youwill get the storiesbehind the music, knowledgeof the composers and ownreflectionsabout the classicalpieces. The introductionlast for about 30 minutes, it is free and freeseating in the hall. Welcome!
Programme
Smetana Haakon Jarl 10 min
Rachmaninov Piano Concerto No. 2 35 min
Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873-1943)
Piano Concerto No. 2
Moderato
Adagio sostenuto
Allegro scherzando
Rachmaninov was an introspective nature and much of his music is tinged with melancholy. The lighter parts often function as temporary resting points, as attempts at comfort without this becoming permanent. His solo career was extraordinarily successful: from the turn of the century right up to the Second World War, he was considered one of the world's foremost pianists.
It was the second piano concerto that, after the premiere in Moscow in 1901, paved the way for his world fame. A few years later the work found its way to Gothenburg. Astrid Berwald - granddaughter of the composer Franz Berwald - played the concert in the Heden Concert Hall on February 7, 1912. However, the city's conservative reviewers preferred Brahms' second symphony under Stenhammar's direction to the new piano concerto. "The orchestra was too dominant," wrote Gothenburg's Morning Post. Göteborgs-Posten's anonymous writer was more sensitive and accurate in his assessment: "Rachmaninov apparently has an exceptionally well-developed sense of timbre, and you notice how much he likes to indulge in the most ear-pleasing timbre combinations."
Stefan Nävermyr (extract)
Intermission25 min
Bartók Concerto for Orchestra 39 min
Bela Bartók (1881-1945)
Concerto for Orchestra
Introduzione
Gioco delle coppie
Elegia
Intermezzo interrotto
Finale
When this music was written in 1943, Bela Bartók had two years left to live. He had come to the United States fleeing a Europe at war and clawed his way through a few lean years in New York. The honorary doctorate at Harvard provided no income. In addition, he became increasingly ill, what previously appeared to be tuberculosis turned out to be leukemia. But he continued to compose as always. Work was his life - and pleasure too, if you will. Like a child, he rested by doing other things.
He was first and foremost a music ethnologist, that is, a recorder and collector of folk music. And it was among other things this immeasurable library, more than 13,000 melodies, he was so keen to save the Second World War. Countless trips in Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Slovakia and Turkey were made with a phonograph as a memory aid. In between, he composed, on top of that a whole lot of teaching as income and change, and of course an extensive activity as a concert pianist in many countries. In addition, he was interested in collecting plants, beetles, learning new languages. Palestrina's music was always on the piano and he never traveled without his thumbed score of Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring under his arm. Is there a diagnosis for this? we would ask today.
The music Bela Bartók wrote was highly influenced by all the music he saw and heard on his collecting trips, but in the later works you can also hear how fascinated he was by the Baroque masters. The concerto for orchestra was commissioned by the Sergei Koussevitsky Music Foundation. Bartók himself has described the music as a journey from austerity via an ominous song to a life-affirming ending. Like Mozart, he composed incredibly quickly, he couldn't get an idea out of his head until the next one appeared. With such a cacophony within, it is no wonder that throughout his life he sought out quiet places.
Bartok himself saw the collection of folk music as his greatest and most important deed for more than one reason: "My own idea is the brotherhood of peoples, brotherhood despite all wars and conflicts. I try - as best I can - to serve that idea in my music: therefore I reject no influences, whether Slovak, Romanian, Arabic, or from other sources." (Bartók, 1931)
KATARINA A KARLSSON
Thursday 24 April 2025: The event ends at approx. 22.00
Friday 25 April 2025: The event ends at approx. 20.30
Saturday 26 April 2025: The event ends at approx. 17.30
Participants
Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra
The Gothenburg Symphony was formed in 1905 and today consists of 109 musicians. The orchestra's base is Göteborgs Konserthus, the funk gem at Götaplatsen that has gathered music lovers since 1935. Since the 2017-2018 season, Santtu-Matias Rouvali has been Chief conductor of the Gothenburg Symphony. Since the 2019-2020 season, Barbara Hannigan is Principal guest conductor. We are also a proud partner of Barbara Hannigan's Equilibrium mentoring program focusing on young singers at the start of their careers.
Wilhelm Stenhammar was the orchestra's chief conductor from 1907 to 1922. He gave the orchestra a strong Nordic profile and invited colleagues Carl Nielsen and Jean Sibelius to the orchestra. Under the direction of conductor Neeme Järvi from 1982-2004, the orchestra made a series of international tours as well as a hundred disc recordings and established themselves among Europe's leading orchestras. In 1996, the Swedish Riksdag appointed the Gothenburg Symphony as Sweden's National Orchestra.
In recent decades, the orchestra has had prominent chief conductors such as Mario Venzago and Gustavo Dudamel, following Kent Nagano as Principal Guest conductor. Anna-Karin Larsson is CEO and artistic director, Gustavo Dudamel honorary conductor and Neeme Järvi chief conductor emeritus. The orchestra's owner is the Västra Götaland Region.
The Gothenburg Symphony works regularly with conductors such as Herbert Blomstedt, Joana Carneiro, Jukka-Pekka Saraste, Christian Zacharias and Anja Bihlmaier.
Santtu-Matias Rouvali conductor
Since 2017, Santtu-Matias Rouvali is the chief conductor of the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra. He also has a successful international career as a conductor and has been hailed by The Guardian as "the Finnish conductor tradition's senesta stortade påvning man bara muste lysna på". Since 2021, Santtu-Matias Rouvali is also the chief conductor of the Philharmonia Orchestra in London. He has toured with the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra and pianist Hélène Grimaud in Nordic capitals as well as with pianist Alice Sara Ott and percussionist Martin Grubinger in Germany. The years 2013-2022 Santtu-Matias Rouvali was chief conductor and artistic director of the Tampere Philharmonic Orchestra in Finland.
During the 2023-2024 season, Santtu-Matias Rouvali will continue to collaborate with orchestras at the top level throughout Europe and the USA, such as the BBC Proms, the New York Philharmonic and many more. He collaborates with soloists such as Leif Ove Andsnes, Arabella Steinbacher, Nemanja Radulovic, Leonidas Kavakos, Bruce Liu, Alice Sara Ott, Sheku Kanneh-Mason, Vadim Gluzman, Randall Goosby and Vilde Frang. With the Gothenburg Symphony, he is recording all of Sibelius' symphonies on disc and so far four albums have been released (Alpha Classics). When he is not conducting, he devotes himself to farming and fishing at his farm outside Tampere.