The end of the season is approaching and the Brno Philharmonic Orchestra has only two subscription programmes to present. The first of these will be Views of the Past by the former child prodigy Polina Osetinskaya, and after that the Season Soloist with British classics, in which this year’s season soloist, Matthew Barley, will perform.
The guest artist in the first of the subscription programmes is the Russian pianist Polina Osetinskaya. Together with Maximem Vengerov, Vadim Repin and Evgeny Kissin she was one of the so-called wunderkind – the most significant talents in the Soviet Union during the period of Perestroika. Unlike her colleagues she did not have a professional teacher – rather her despotic father was in charge, though he could not even read music. At the age of fourteen she ran away from home, from Moscow to Saint Petersburg, where she was taken on by the teacher Marina Wolf. Under her she not only learned but mainly she got rid of bad habits. In the first half of the evening Osetinskaya will play Bach’s Piano Concerto No. 5 in F Minor and the Concerto for Piano and Strings in F Minor by Alfred Schnittke. In the second half of the evening Le tombeau de Couperin by Maurice Ravel and Pulcinella by Igor Stravinsky will be heard. These two suites and Schnittke’s concerto are linked in drawing inspiration from the past, since they are works by European modernists inspired by the music of the Baroque. The baton will be taken up for the first time by the twenty-three-year-old Venezuelan Ilyich Rivas, who despite his youth has a wealth of experience in conducting orchestras around the world. The concert will take place on May 4 and Friday May 5 from 7.30 p.m. in Besední dům.
A week later in Besední dům the philharmonic will conclude its season with its resident soloist Matthew Barley. The programme will include the magical canon for string orchestra and bell by the Estonian Arvo Pärt, dedicated to the memory of Benjamin Britten, followed by the Cello Concerto in E Minor op. 58 by Edward Elgar, a masterpiece of the romantic cello repertoire, and Beethoven’s energetic second symphony. The concert will be conducted by the British Alexander Joel. The concert will be performed on May 10, 11 and 12 from 7.30 in Besední dům.
