Polish Sinfonia Iuventus Orchestra and Bomsori Kim will perform Krzysztof Penderecki's Violin Concerto No. 2 and Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy's Symphony No. 3 during the concert on 28 April 2018 at 7 p.m. at the Witold Lutosławski Concert Studio of the Polish Radio in Warsaw.
Two pieces from the programme of the April concert are complemented with interesting subtitles revealing certain intentions of their creators. Such subtitles are often added by later editors, not always in accordance with the authors’ will, but in these cases, they come from the authors themselves.
Felix Mendelssohn’s “Scottish” Symphony is his artistic response to the immense sensations he absorbed during a long summer trip through Scotland in 1829. The ideas born at that time took a very long time to mature, because it was over a dozen years later that he finished the work, in the pages of which we can find an auditory reminiscence of his visit to the ruined chapel of the Holyrood Palace in Edinburgh, echoes of lively folk melodies in a cheerful scherzo, or the touching (alleged) “prayer of Queen Mary Stuart” in the quotation from Mendelssohn’s own version of Ave Maria.
On the other hand, the subtitle of Krzysztof Penderecki’s Violin Concerto No. 2, composed in 1996 for the wonderful Anne-Sophie Mutter, was explained by the composer himself (in a conversation with Jakub Haufa, 2007), in a very interesting statement giving a (quite rare) insight into the creative process: “The Violin Concerto No. 2, “Metamorphoses” was created in two stages. And since the Concerto was subject to change, the title “Metamorphoses” seemed appropriate and correct to me. I wasn’t convinced about my initial idea, it seemed that this wasn’t what I wanted to write. The […] important motifs appear constantly, but in an ongoing process of metamorphosis, so they are treated differently every time: in a different instrumentation, in a different character, but these main motifs appear in the Concerto from beginning to end. […] While Anne-Sophie Mutter was playing, I noticed that there are not many lyrical moments in this Concerto. This was not her suggestion, but after this meeting I thought that it was necessary to expand the Concerto with various lyrical themes, so that it would not be just such a virtuoso work. Then I added the finishing touches and these so-called secondary motifs appeared in there.”
This very interesting work, shimmering with virtuosity, but also enchanting with the lyricism of the new, “changed” motifs, will be performed in Warsaw by the brilliant South Korean violinist Bomsori Kim, who combines dazzling technique with great musicality and depth of interpretation. She is the winner of many prestigious competitions, and the Polish audience remembers her especially from 2016, when she took second place at the 15th International Henryk Wieniawski Violin Competition in Poznań. The concert will be led by Łukasz Borowicz.
Media patronage: Polish Music Information Centre POLMIC.
Information about tickets at: www.sinfoniaiuventus.pl
