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Few composers captured life’s struggles as vividly as Tchaikovsky. ‘This is Fate,’ wrote the composer in 1877 as he grappled with the opening notes of his Symphony No. 4. ‘It hangs above your head like the sword of Damocles.’ By the symphony’s final pages, Tchaikovsky had wrested hope from despair. John StorgaÌŠrds conducts his ´óÏó´«Ã½ Philharmonic in this full-blooded symphony, after the delicate, white luminosity of Hans Abrahamsen’s Horn Concerto and the brusque drama of Sibelius’s symphonic fantasia Pohjola’s Daughter, based on a tale from Finnish folk epic the Kalevala, in which the ancient bard Väinämöinen attempts to woo the beautiful Daughter of the North. The Prom opens with Schumann’s much-overlooked dramatic overture for his opera on the medieval legend of St Genevieve of Brabant, Genoveva.

Broadcast live on ´óÏó´«Ã½ Radio 3

Stefan Dohr © Simon Pauly