Auckland Philharmonia: Mozart 40

Following a New Zealand premiere of a work by Swedish composer Andrea Torrodi, Ilya Gringolts joins the orchestra for a performance of Prokofiev's First Piano Concerto and the programme rounds off with the title work of the concert: Mozart's Symphony No 40.

Norwegian Eivind Aadland conducts.

Ilya Gringolts Photo: Tomasz Trzebiatowski

Andrea TARRODI: Lucioles

Andrea Tarrodi Photo: Anette Nantell; ex artist's website

Commissioned by the Swedish Chamber Orchestra in 2011, this single movement work is influenced by a haiku of the same name – "Lucioles" being French for fireflies:

By the lily leaves
the fireflies anchor
the lake is illuminated

Tarrodi’s work is visual and expressive in nature. She says that she prefers writing for orchestras “because of the huge palate of sounds available”.

Having studied at the Royal College of Music in Stockholm and the Conservatoria di Musica in Perugia, Tarrodi has certainly made a name for herself as a composer of note. Her music is regularly performed across Scandinavia and Europe and it’s wonderful that New Zealand will now hear this piece for the first time in performance.

PROKOFIEV: Violin Concerto No 1

Described as the enfant terrible of the St Petersburg Conservatory, Prokofiev regularly riled his composition tutors with his modernist tendencies and his marks were consequently a bit lacklustre. However, he enjoyed the notoriety, and the story goes that he took great delight in performing his own Piano concerto in a 1914 performance competition at the Conservatory. The jury begrudgingly awarded him the prize.

The Violin Concerto in D major was meant to be premiered in November 1917, but was stalled by the October Revolution. The concerto would not be performed until 1923, in a concert in Paris. Unfortunately, the great young modernist of St Petersburg was rather upstaged by compatriot Igor Stravinsky and his Octet for Winds. (The Parisian audience were by this stage sold on the shock of Stravinsky’s radical dissonance and Prokofiev’s now five-year-old Violin Concerto was seen as a bit too romantic.) Fortunately, the Hungarian violinist Joseph Szigeti was in the audience and was so impressed that he brought the work into his concert repertory.

The concerto is now considered one of the great violin works of the 20^th century, and Ilya Gringolts is no stranger to it. His 2004 recording with the Gothenberg Symphony Orchestra has been described as one of the finest available – his playing revealing “a sensitivity to accent and phrasing that constantly engages the ear.”

Johann Paul von WESTHOFF: Imitation of the bells

Played as an encore by Ilya Gringolts

MOZART: Symphony No 40 in G minor

We don’t always know the exact date that a piece was finished, but on the 25^th July 1788, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart entered the Symphony No. 40 in G minor into his catalogue of completed works.

This was an extraordinarily industrious summer for the already prolific composer. In the space of a few weeks, Mozart complete the 39^th, the 40^th, and his final symphony, the 41^st. The latter – the Jupiter - may be considered the greatest, but the 40^th has arguably the best-known tune.

Recorded by RNZ Concert, Auckland Town Hall, 14 September 2023
Producer: Tim Dodd
Engineer: Adrian Hollay