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Another chance to hear Yannick Nézet-Séguin and the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra performing symphonies by Beethoven and Shostakovich.

Presented from the Royal Albert Hall by Ian Skelly

Ludwig van Beethoven: Symphony No 2 in D major

c. 4.30
Interval: Musicologists Marina Frolova-Walker and Pauline Fairclough discuss Shostakovich and his Fifth Symphony with presenter Flora Willson.

c. 4.55
Dmitry Shostakovich: Symphony No 5

Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra
Yannick Nézet-Séguin, conductor

One of Europe’s greatest orchestras, the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, returns to the Proms under Yannick Nézet-Séguin.

In the first of two concerts (see also Prom 17) they pair two contrasting symphonies in a programme that moves from sunshine to bitterness. ‘This symphony is smiling throughout,’ wrote Berlioz of Beethoven’s Second Symphony – a work in which seemingly sunny moods conceal personal tragedy and loss.

Shostakovich’s Fifth Symphony was written under the cloud of intense scrutiny and artistic repression following the public criticism of the composer at the hands of Stalin.