大象传媒

In his first concert with the LPO as their Conductor Emeritus, Vladimir Jurowski presents a programme featuring two 20th-century masterpieces with the spirit of Russia at their heart.

After Alina Ibragimova's and Vladimir Jurowski's multi-award-winning recording of Shostakovich's Violin Concerto No 1 was released in last year, a critic hailed her interpretation as having 'an unvarnished truth about it. It鈥檚 the kind of playing that looks you unblinkingly in the eye and tells it like it is.' The emotional and searingly intense concerto was finished in 1948 but not heard in public until seven years later. The gap was due to another of Shostakovich's crises in confidence brought on by a very public humiliation at the hands of the Soviet authorities. But by 1955 Shostakovich's principal tormentors, Joseph Stalin and Andrei Zhdanov, were dead and the premiere revealed a major milestone among 20th-century concertos, which has never since been out of the repertoire.

Rachmaninov, too, was no stranger to crises of confidence (which often coincided with the premieres of his symphonies). At its 1935 premiere, the Third Symphony was dismissed by the critics who said it wasn't up to the first two, both of which in turn had been critically dismissed at their premieres. But, written for the great Philadelphia Orchestra, the Third is prime Rachmaninov, an engaging combination of his trademark lyrical Russian nostalgia and, in its finale, a virtuosic exuberance which has more than a nod to Hollywood.

A world premiere by LPO Composer-in-Residence Brett Dean completes the programme.

Introduced live from the Royal Festival Hall by Hannah French.

Shostakovich: Violin Concerto No 1 in A minor, Op 77

8.15 pm
Interval Music (from CD)
Rachmaninov: Valse; Romance and Tarantella (Suite No 2, Op.17 for two pianos)
Martha Argerich & Gabriela Montero (pianos)

8.35 pm
Brett Dean: Notturno inquieto (Rivisitato)
Rachmaninov: Symphony No 3 in A minor, Op 44

Alina Ibragimova (violin)
London Philharmonic Orchestra
Vladimir Jurowski (conductor)