In its program tomorrow, the National Symphony Orchestra (NSO, 國家交響樂團) brings together two composers who don’t have much in common.
“There couldn’t be a bigger contrast than Beethoven and Ravel. Sometimes it is very revealing for both composers to be heard so close to each other,” said conductor Gunther Herbig.
The program, titled “Greatness of Beethoven (命運德意志),” features three highly popular works in classical music repertoire. The two by Beethoven are formidable, pointed works about the human condition.
Photo courtesy of NSO
Leonore Overture No. 3 is one of four overtures Beethoven composed for the opera Fidelio. The opera is about the Spanish nobleman Florestan, who is imprisoned wrongfully and then rescued by his wife Leonore, a liberation that is prefigured in Leonore Overture No. 3 by a virtuosic violin passage.
NSO will also play Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, which weathered a weak premiere in 1808 to become one of the most recognizable pieces of classical music today.
In the way of his overture, the Fifth Symphony and its iconic four-note opening — three Gs and a long E flat — progress from darkness into light, in a dramatic musical shorthand for how victory arrives in the end.
“It is educational on a human level, especially for young people. Everybody meets difficulties and problems in his life. Not to give in, but to stand up again after you have been knocked down and to succeed — this is an incredible message,”
The NSO will present a modified orchestration of doubled woodwinds to compensate for the size of the modern string section, which is larger than Beethoven’s, and for the acoustics of today’s concert hall.
“In Beethoven’s time, they played in much, much smaller halls — halls where you could seat 180 people. Now we have one and a half thousand people in the halls,” he said.
Beethoven’s serious-minded musical drama will be juxtaposed with French composer Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G Major, a light study of musical viewpoints.
Ravel wrote the concerto in the 1920s, when popular music from around the world was reaching the height of influence in Paris’ music scene, said piano soloist Alexandre Tharaud.
Opening with a whip-crack, the concerto’s first movement showcases the bright and balletic interplay of French popular song and jazz idioms, including a direct reference to George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue.
The second movement is suddenly Mozartian, featuring a gentle, clear-voiced melody that is carried the first three minutes by a lone piano.
“Beethoven is always out there addressing the whole mankind. Ravel is much more intimate, much more personal,” Herbig said.
The NSO plays “Greatness of Beethoven” tomorrow in Greater Taichung and Friday at a sold-out show at the National Concert Hall in Taipei.
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