Ferencsik season ticket 5

STRAVINSKY: Pulcinella – suite
COPLAND: Clarinet Concerto
RACHMANINOFF: Symphony No. 3 in A minor, Op. 44

Martin Fröst – clarinet
Hungarian National Philharmonic
Conductor: Kirill Karabits

Destination: America

This programme presents works by three composers, all of whom – like so many in the 20th century – completed their careers in America. Copland's parents emigrated to America from Lithuania, while Rachmaninoff and Stravinsky arrived from Russia. Three strong personalities, three musical styles. Rachmaninoff continued to compose genuinely romantic music after emigrating. Stravinsky's Pulcinella was first performed in Paris in 1920 by Sergei Diaghilev's world-famous ballet troupe, with set and costume design by Pablo Picasso. Stravinsky adapted the music of Baroque composer Pergolesi, thus beginning his neo-Classical creative period. Aaron Copland's clarinet concerto, which premiered in 1950, was commissioned by the famous jazz clarinetist Benny Goodman. It mixes jazz elements and, as one critic wrote, "bitter-sweet lyricism". This bright kaleidoscope of styles comes to us courtesy of an outstanding Swedish clarinetist and a Vienna-educated Ukrainian conductor.