SWISS REFERENCES – WAGNER, BRITTEN & BRAHMS

The artistic development of the Luzerner Sinfonieorchester culminates this season in a pronounced focus on Late Romantic repertoire. Yet this repertoire does not only point forward – towards modernity and the orchestra’s future – but also back to strong traditions.

Richard Wagner’s “Siegfried Idyll” recalls that Romanticism itself wrote history in Lucerne: the work was composed in Tribschen as a personal gift to Cosima Wagner. In Brahms’ Fourth Symphony, the tradition reaches even further back – to Bach. Gently undulating melancholy, passionate longing, warm cantabile lines and a cheerfully sharpened grotesque lead into a finale based on a Baroque model: a chaconne with a strict, almost chorale-like character.

Benjamin Britten’s Double Concerto for violin and viola also looks back and forward at the same time. In this vital early work, the interplay between the solo instruments and the orchestra recalls the energetic spirit of the concerto grosso – fresh, agile and full of energy.

Vilde Frang and Lawrence Power, two outstanding soloists, are at the centre of the evening. On the podium, Diego Ceretta fulfils the promise already evident in his earlier appearance as a Rising Star of the Luzerner Sinfonieorchester.