BSO/Classical New England — 2024/11/23

 I forgot to post last week  I had attended on Friday afternoon, and it was a good concert: a Mozart piano concerto and Tchaikovsky's Sixth Symphony, "Pathétique." Catch the replay on Monday evening if you can,

Today we're getting an "encore broadcast" of the concert from last April 6, which WCRB describes as follows:

Saturday, November 23, 2024
8:00pm

The first program in the BSO’s Music for the Senses festival centers on Alexander Scriabin’s Prometheus, Poem of Fire, in which the composer depicts the evolution of human consciousness. Also on the program are Anna Clyne’s Color Field, inspired in part by the vibrancy of the Mark Rothko 1961 painting Orange, Red, Yellow, Richard Wagner’s ecstatic Prelude and Liebestod from Tristan und Isolde, and Franz Liszt’s Prometheus.

Andris Nelsons, conductor
Yefim Bronfman, piano
Tanglewood Festival Chorus

Anna CLYNE Color Field
Richard WAGNER Prelude and Liebestod from Tristan and Isolde
Franz LISZT Prometheus
Alexander SCRIABIN Prometheus, Poem of Fire, for piano, color organ, chorus, and orchestra

This concert was originally broadcast on April 6, 2024, and is no longer available on demand.

To hear a preview of Scriabin's Prometheus, Poem of Fire with pianist Yefim Bronfman, use the player above, and read the transcript below.

TRANSCRIPT (lightly edited for clarity):

The program notes are linked at the BSO's own performance detail page:

Andris Nelsons, conductor 
Yefim Bronfman, piano 
Anna Gawboy, lighting research
Justin Townsend, lighting designer
Tanglewood Festival Chorus
 James Burton, conductor

Anna CLYNE Color Field 
WAGNER Prelude and Liebestod from Tristan and Isolde
Intermission
LISZT Prometheus 
SCRIABIN Prometheus, Poem of Fire, for piano, color organ, chorus, and orchestra

This week's performances by the Tanglewood Festival Chorus are supported by the Alan J. and Suzanne W. Dworsky Fund for Voice and Chorus.

A program of color: It opens with Anna Clyne’s Color Field, inspired in part by the vibrancy of a Mark Rothko painting. Followed by Richard Wagner’s ecstatic Prelude and Liebestod from Tristan and Isolde, and Franz Liszt’s Prometheus. The program closes with Alexander Scriabin’s Prometheus, Poem of Fire. When Alexander Scriabin wrote Prometheus, Poem of Fire, he conceived of a “light organ” that would project colors corresponding to his music. Prometheus premiered in 1911 with future BSO Music Director Serge Koussevitzky, whose 150th birthday year we celebrate in 2024.

I wrote about it at the time (with several typos). Presumably the links to the reviews still work. As you can see, the reviews were hardly raves, but apart from the Wagner (which is a staple on WCRB's regular programming) this is not frequently performed music, so it may be worth listening just to experience something unfamiliar.

I'm guessing that the reason WCRB isn't giving us the live concert is that one of the pieces is accompanied by "lush projections of based on images from [Georgia] O' Keeffe's lifes and work." If I'.m right it's ironic that they decided to replace it with another concert which includes background color changes.