The New Zealand Herald Premier Series: Winter Magic
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Conductor Giordano Bellincampi
Cello Narek Hakhnazaryan
Sofia Gubaidulina Fairytale Poem
Shostakovich Cello Concerto No.2
Tchaikovsky Symphony No.4
‘Fate, that ominous power… There is no alternative but to submit to Fate.’ So Tchaikovsky wrote, and so his symphony unfolds. Fate is represented by the implacable brass fanfare which begins the piece and which at crucial moments crashes into Tchaikovsky’s passionate outpouring of emotion.
Sofia Gubaidulina’s piece illustrates a fairy tale about a small piece of chalk that dreams of drawing flowers and trees, but is forced to draw ‘boring words, numbers, and geometric figures on the blackboard’.
Another composer persecuted by Fate was Shostakovich, who looked inward in this darkly glittering concerto.