The Full Works Concert - Wednesday 16 April 2014
Jane Jones presents a concerto from a little-known composer who may have written some of Haydn's symphonies.
Tonight's concert begins with a brilliant recording of Brahms’ Academic Festival Overture. It was composed during the summer of 1880 as a musical "thank you" to the University of Breslau, which had awarded Brahms with an honorary doctorate the previous year. Daniel Barenboim conducts it tonight with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.
Dvořák was inspired to write his Violin Concerto after having met Joseph Joachim in 1878 and composed the work with the intention of dedicating it him. However, when he finished it in 1879, Joachim was skeptical about it. The violinist was a strict follower of traditional form and was wary of Dvořák's departures from convention. However, Joachim never said anything outright and instead claimed to be editing the solo part. He never actually performed the piece.
We next hear the Symphony in D major by the Bohemian composer, Adalbert Gyrowetz (pictured). It was while employed by the Count Franz von Fünfkirchen in Brno that he started composing, among other things, symphonies, of which he was eventually to write more than 60. In 1785 he moved to Vienna, where he met Mozart, who performed one of Gyrowetz's symphonies. He later established that some symphonies that had been published as the work of Haydn were in fact his work.
Fauré's popular Requiem was almost certainly a musical tribute to his father, who died in 1885, three years before work on the Requiem began. Fauré created something different from other composers' Requiems because he had no clear religious beliefs. So in place of the sombre nature of many that had gone before, Fauré’s is noted for its calm, serene and peaceful outlook, anticipating a restful and fear-free concept of death.
Johannes Brahms: Academic Festival Overture Opus 80
Daniel Barenboim conducts the Chicago Symphony Orchestra
Antonin Dvorak: Violin Concerto in A minor Opus 53
Violin: Jack Liebeck
Garry Walker conducts the Royal Scottish National Orchestra
Adalbert Gyrowetz: Symphony in D major Opus 12 No.1
Matthias Bamert conducts the London Mozart Players
Gabriel Faure: Requiem Opus 48
Organ: David Burchell
Edward Higginbottom conducts Capricorn and the Choir of New College, Oxford
