Full programme

  • Gabrieli, Canzona Seconda  (4mins)
  • Bach, Brandenburg Concerto No.3, III. Allegro  (6mins)
  • Beethoven, String Quartet No.14, I. Adagio  (6mins)
  • Mahler, Symphony No.1, III. Feierlich und Gemessun  (12mins)
  • Stravinsky, The Firebird Suite: Infernal Dance, Berceuse & Finale  (12mins)
  • Glass, Symphony No.2, Movement III  (12mins)

Performers

Introduction

I am so pleased to welcome you to the next in our ‘CBSO Explores’ series of concerts.

CBSO Explores is our ongoing project to try out new forms of concert presentation, and to welcome creative collaborations, that might help us to discover new ways of bringing people into closer connection with incredible music.

For this very special performance, you will find the orchestra in the round, with Kazuki on a central platform. You will be able to stand, or sit, in the central section, and move about if you’d like to. The programme, which runs from Gabrieli to Philip Glass, is made up of pieces that really lend themselves to, or even invite, this sort of player/audience dynamic.

You will have the chance to hear familiar music as you have never heard it before, guided by Music Director Kazuki Yamada and theatre director Tom Morris, who explains:

“The programme starts with the music of Gabrieli who wrote for the St Mark’s Basilica in Venice, where there were two organ lofts. Gabrieli wrote antiphonal music for two choirs and sometimes two brass ensembles to perform at the opposite ends of the cathedral so the congregation could hear the sound coming from different directions. The interlocking melodies of the trumpets are scored so you can hear them almost like a conversation, as if two brass choirs were calling to each other across the space in between.”

“The rest of the programme traces the history of counterpoint. In Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No.3, you will hear the melody as it is passed from section to section around the room. In Phillip Glass’s second symphony it is the patterns of the minimalist scoring which you will be able to hear passed between the full orchestra that surrounds you.”

“The programme includes some repertoire which I have already explored in similar ways: Beethoven’s String Quartet Opus 131 has been presented in a staged performance by the Sacconi Quartet, inspired by Goethe’s comment that the late quartets where like four old friends talking to each other; and the third movement of Mahler’s First Symphony was the subject of an immersive workshop with members of the CBSO in September 2023. But today’s concert is an experiment in real time and we will be hearing the pieces in this way for the first time alongside you. I am particularly looking forward to hearing the three movements of Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite in glorious surround sound, which was a suggestion by members of our orchestra and will be both a new experience for me as it will for you!”

As with all CBSO concerts, we’d love to know what you think. So, please do stay for a drink after the performance, and share your experience with our brilliant players, Tom, Kazuki, and the CBSO team.

Finally, we’re hugely grateful for the generous support provided by Dunard Fund towards our CBSO Explores series.

Thank you for coming,

Emma Stenning
Chief Executive