The Full Works Concert - Tuesday 18 March 2014

The brilliant Tine Thing Helseth plays Albinoni tonight, alongside great works from Mozart, Wagner, Tchaikovsky and John Ireland.

Tonight's Full Works Concert opens with Richard Wagner's overture to The Flying Dutchman. The composer claimed that he had been inspired to write the opera following a stormy sea crossing he made from Latvia to London in July and August 1839. In the opera, Wagner uses a number of leitmotifs associated with the different characters and themes. They are all introduced in the overture, which begins with a well-known storm motif before moving into the Dutchman and Senta themes.

The astonishing young trumpeter Tine Thing Helseth (pictured) follows with a trumpet arrangement of Albinoni's Oboe Concerto in Bb major. She not only plays the trumpet on it, but she is also directing the Norwegian Chamber Orchestra.

Next up, Mozart's Symphony No.25 in G minor. Composing music in G minor might not sound like a controversial musical decision, but it was unusual in Mozart's time. With wide leaps in the tunes, and brisk rhythms in the strings, both this and the Symphony No.40 which is also in G minor, are part of Mozart’s 'Sturm und Drang' (storm and stress) repertoire.

A Downland Suite was written by John Ireland in 1932 for the National Brass Band Championship of Great Britain at a time when original pieces were regularly commissioned for major contests. The suite is a pictorial depiction of the composer's beloved Sussex downs. In keeping with its aims as a contest piece, the suite is technically complicated and very difficult. It's often played, as it is tonight, in its orchestral arrangement.

Tonight's Concert ends with Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto in D major. Along with the concertos of Bruch and Mendelssohn , this work is one of the most important pieces for the violin in the history of Romantic music. It is also a piece that, like Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture, is implicitly linked with the composer's emotional turmoil and sham marriage.

Richard Wagner: The Flying Dutchman – Overture
Lorin Maazel conducts the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra

Tomaso Albinoni: Oboe Concerto in Bb major Opus 7 No.3 (arranged for trumpet)
Trumpet: Tine Thing Helseth
Norwegian Chamber Orchestra

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Symphony No.25 in G minor K.183
Nikolaus Harnoncourt conducts Concentus Musicus, Vienna

John Ireland: A Downland Suite
Richard Hickox conducts City of London Sinfonia

Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky: Violin Concerto in D major Opus 35
Violin: Ilya Gringolts
Itzhak Perlman conducts Israel Philharmonic Orchestra