BSO — 2011/10/27-11/01; 2011/11/03-05

I'm posting about two weeks' programs because the BSO website has the same page for both. My guess is they are doing it because both have the same conductor, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos.

Schumann, Strauss, Haydn and Wagner 

Schumann and Strauss 
October 27- 29 & November 1
Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, conductor
Gidon Kremer, violin
SCHUMANN Violin Concerto
STRAUSS Ein Heldenleben

The internationally admired Latvian violinist Gidon Kremer joins Spanish conductor and frequent BSO guest Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos in the first of the conductor’s two BSO programs this season. Kremer plays the relatively rarely heard Violin Concerto of Robert Schumann, a melodically driven, quintessentially Romantic piece written in Schumann’s last productive year of 1853 for Joseph Joachim, the outstanding violinist of the age, who unfortunately never performed it. Richard Strauss’s tone-poem Ein Heldenleben (“A Heroic Life”) is a romp through the composer’s own personal musical landscape—a multi-faceted tour-de-force culmination of his phenomenal tone poems of the 1890s.Podcasts for this series Include:

1. Video Podcast: A Conversation with Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos
2. Audio Concert Preview by Marc Mandel, narrated by Eleanor McGourty.

Haydn and Wagner 
November 3-5
Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, conductor
James Morris, bass-baritone
Tanglewood Festival Chorus, John Oliver, Conductor
HAYDN Symphony No. 1
HAYDN Symphony No. 100,Military
WAGNER Excerpts from Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg

Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos opens his second BSO program of the season with the rarely heard Haydn symphony designated as “No. 1,” written about 1757. This ten-minute, three-movement work comes very early in the history of the symphony genre. By contrast, Haydn’s Military Symphony dates from the zenith of the Classical symphony. Extended excerpts from Wagner’s humane masterpiece Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg— with bass-baritone James Morris in the role of Hans Sachs, and also featuring the Tanglewood Festival Chorus—make up the second half of the program.Podcasts for this series Include:

1. Video Podcast: A Conversation with Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos

The Globe review of this week's Schumann and Strauss was generally favorable, but with some criticism both of the concerto itself and of the performances.

Although this concert was part of my subscription, I exchanged the ticket because I had a party to go to. Instead, I'll be attending the January 13 matinee presentation of Weber's Overture to Euryanthe, Beethoven's Piano Concerto No.1, the Symphony No. 6 by John Harbison, and "Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks" by Strauss. This will be my second time hearing the program, since I already had a ticket for the 12th, when the Harbison symphony will receive it's world premiere performance. The principal reason for going a second time is to give the Harbison a second hearing. The BSO performed his first three symphonies last season and I found them worth hearing. This season, they'll be playing the 4th and 5th in November and December, respectively, and they commissioned the 6th.

I'll be listening to Classical New England — as WCRB now calls itself since they've bought a couple of other stations — as usual, for the live broadcast/webcast on Saturday and the repeat Sunday at 1:00.

As for the Haydn and Wagner program, I have a ticket for Thursday and expect to be there. It should be good.