Saturday, November 25, 2017

BSO — 2017/11/25

This week we get "the two B's:" Beethoven and Bruckner. Add piano soloist Rudolf Buchbinder, and we have "the three B's" — although not the ones people usually mean by that phrase. Here, to give greater precision, is the description from the BSO's program detail page:
BSO Music Director Andris Nelsons and eminent Austrian pianist Rudolf Buchbinder pair up for Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 1, a robustly elegant work with which Beethoven made his name as a composer-performer of extraordinary abilities and personality in mid-1790s Vienna. Anton Bruckner wrote his warm, majestic Fourth Symphony in 1874, but as with many of his works he subjected it to extensive revision. Though the 1881 premiere of the second version under Hans Richter in Vienna brought one of the composer's greatest successes, a third version of the score dates from 1888.
(Some emphasis added.)

That page has the usual audio previews, program notes, and performer bios.

I didn't hear either of the previous performances, but the reviews are in. The one in the Globe is entirely favorable. The two (!) in the Boston Musical Intelligencer (the first here, and the second here) have some disappointments, but also found a lot to like. The first review has lengthy descriptions of both pieces which could take the place of the official program notes from the orchestra.

As always, the concert will be streamed and broadcast live over WCRB at 8:00 p.m., Boston Time, with the usual rebroadcast/stream on Monday, December 4, also at 8. As you can see from their homepage, they offer a lot of other recorded concerts and other music-related material which may be of interest, in addition to their regular programming.

Bruckner's symphonies are on the long side, but not hard to listen to, so I think this should be an enjoyable evening.

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