Conductor – Roberto Salvalaio
Soloist – Adriana Dogariu

Programme

Frederic Chopin – Andante spianato and The great polonaise op. 22
Witold Lutoslawski – Variations on a theme by Paganini for piano and orchestra
Henryk Gorecki – Concert for hapsichord and chord orchestra op. 40
Alexandr Borodin – 2nd Symphony in si minor

Event organised in collaboration with the Polish Institute of Bucharest

A special symphonic concert, organised in collaboration with the Polish Institute of Bucharest, will be staging concerts by Polish composers Frederic Chopin, Witold Lutoslawski and Henryk Gorecki, and also the Second Symphony by Alexandr Borodin.

“Andante spianato” and “The Great Polonaise” op. 22 were composed by Chopin during 1830 and 1834, the first being the Great Polonaise, written for piano and orchestra, to which Andante spianato was later added – a piece for piano solo, intended as an introduction to the concert. Despite the fact that the first piece ever composed by Chopin, at the precocious age of 7 years old, was a polonaise, the Great Polonaise marked a breakpoint for this genre, as the master afterwards left the genre aside for several years.

The programme continues with two works from the second half of the XXth century: Lutoslawski’s Variations on a theme by Paganini, for piano and orchestra, published in 1979 as a revision of the first Variations for 2 pianos (1941), and the Concert for harpsichord and chord orchestra op. 40 by Gorecki (1980).

The end of the musical evening will be marked by the 2nd Symphony in Si minor by Alexandr Borodin – the Russian composer’s most relevant major work, barely finished in 1876, after 7 years of intermittent labour. Franz Liszt’s admiration regarding this symphony is worth noting, as the master, a friend of Borodin and admirer of his creation, advised him to preserve the piece in its initial form, although critics at that time had stated the contrary.