MUSICAL STORYTELLING: THE FIREBIRD
Stravinsky’s big break came with The Firebird, his first ballet written for the Parisian company Ballets Russes. With inspiration from Slavic folk tales and music that left no listener indifferent, it put the young composer’s name on everybody’s lips. In the symphonic poem Luonnotar, Sibelius retells the creation myth from the epic Kalevala. An orchestral masterpiece and a display of skill for the soloist.
The concert will be broadcasted live on Berwaldhallen Play and at Swedish Radio P2 November 6 at 7 pm.
Participants
The Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra is a multiple-award-winning ensemble renowned for its high artistic standard and stylistic breadth, as well as collaborations with the world’s finest composers, conductors, and soloists. It regularly tours all over Europe and the world and has an extensive and acclaimed recording catalogue.
Daniel Harding has been Music Director of the SRSO since 2007, and since 2019 also its Artistic Director. His tenure will last throughout the 2024/2025 season. Two of the orchestra’s former chief conductors, Herbert Blomstedt and Esa-Pekka Salonen, have since been named Conductors Laureate, and continue to perform regularly with the orchestra.
The Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra performs at Berwaldhallen, concert hall of the Swedish Radio, and is a cornerstone of Swedish public service broadcasting. Its concerts are heard weekly on the Swedish classical radio P2 and regularly on national public television SVT. Several concerts are also streamed on-demand on Berwaldhallen Play and broadcast globally through the EBU.
Sopranen Camilla Tilling har i över två decennier framträtt på opera- och konsertscener världen över. Tidiga operaroller som Sophie i Rosenkavaljeren, Pamina in Trollflöjten, Ilia i Idomeneo, Susanna i Figaros bröllop och Zerlina i Don Giovanni gav Tilling engagemang vid scener som the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, San Francisco Opera, Bayerische Staatsoper, Opéra national de Paris, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Teatro alla Scala och Metropolitan, New York. Bland senare roller kan nämnas Guvernanten i The Turn of the Screw, Euridice i Orfeo ed Euridice, Donna Clara i Dvärgen, Greta i Hans och Greta, l’Ange i Franciskus av Assisi, Blanche i Karmelitsystrarna och Mélisande i Pelléas och Mélisande.
Bland Tillings nyligen genomförda engagemang på konsertscenen kan nämnas Bernard Haitinks sista konsert vid Concertgebouw, Brahms Requiem med Birmingham Symphony Orchestra och Mirga Gražinytė Tyla, Dutilleuxs Correspondances med Los Angeles Philharmonic och Esa-Pekka Salonen, Mahlers fyra med Orchestre de Paris och Thomas Hengelbrock samt Bergs Sieben frühe Lieder med både Sydney Symphony Orchestra och Christoph von Dohnányi samt London Symphony Orchestra och François-Xavier Roth. Tilling har även turnerat med Peter Sellars uppsättningar av Matteuspassionen och Johannespassionen. Bland höjdpunkter säsongen 2022/2023 kan nämnas Griegs Peer Gynt med Cincinnati Symphony, Irgen-Jensens Japanischer Frühling med Karajan-Akademie of Berliner Philharmoniker samt Bachs Matteuspassion med Atlanta Symphony Orchestra.
Programme
At the beginning of the 1900s, Sergei Diaghilev worked variedly to promote and encourage new and radical Russian culture. This work included establishing the Ballets Russes in Paris, for which the young and still unknown Igor Stravinsky had orchestrated music by Chopin. It wasn’t long before he was commissioned to write new music for a Russian folk tale, which was to become Stravinsky’s big breakthrough.
The first of Stravinsky’s Russian ballets, The Firebird, was dedicated to Andrey Rimsky-Korsakov, a friend of the same age, and son of composer Nikolai, who had been like a second father to Stravinsky, and also taught him orchestration.
Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov’s influence can be more than discerned in the background of the music. Not least Stravinsky’s treatment of the orchestra should have garnered appreciation. Stravinsky’s use of musical motifs and structure show clear impressions from his role model. Some of the folk song tunes in The Firebird can also be found in Rimsky-Korsakov’s earlier work.
At night, the radiant firebird dances into the immortal Koschei’s enchanted garden, stalked by Prince Ivan. The prince manages to catch the bird after a duel, but sets it free again in return for a magical feather. In the garden, the prince watches 13 princesses dancing, and falls instantly in love with one of them. He reveals himself and is invited to participate in the princesses’ Khorovod, a Russian folk dance.
When dawn breaks, the princesses disappear into Koschei’s palace. Ivan forces the gate open to free his beloved, but is captured by Koschei’s monstruous subjects. The wizard threatens to turn the prince to stone, but Ivan raises the magical feather in despair, and the firebird comes to his rescue. It forces Koschei and all his subjects to dance an infernal dance to the point of exhaustion, and the egg that hides Koschei’s immortality is broken in pieces. The wizard dies, the spell is broken and the prisoners are freed.
Ann-Marie Nilsson
Approximate concert length: 50 min
Tickets
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