NOVAT Grand Symphony Concert

A new grandiose symphonic program on NOVAT's Grand Stage is Johannes Brahms' Violin Concerto in D major and Gustav Mahler's famous Symphony No. 5 in Cis moll.

The Violin Concerto in D major was written by Brahms in 1878. The composer dedicated his only violin concerto to one of the greatest violinists of the epoch and his friend Joseph Joachim. The concerto was first performed in January 1879 in Leipzig. The audience received the work with delight, which could not be said unequivocally about all the performers. For example, Polish violinist Henryk Wieniawski claimed that “it is impossible to play a concerto,” and the famous conductor Hans von Bulow said that this concerto is not “for the violin,” but “against the violin.” However, Brahms' outstanding work still won the hearts of musicians.… The three-part concerto is characterized by conciseness and clarity of form, it contains dramatic images, but they do not destroy the overall mood of solemnity and enlightenment. The solo part of the violin is truly virtuosic and requires the performer to have the highest level of mastery of the instrument, incredible emotional impact, and at the same time, expressive sensuality, disembodyness and ghostliness in cantilena images.

For Mahler, symphonies were an opportunity to talk about the deepest and most exciting issues of his life. “I saw your soul naked, completely naked. It stretched out before me like a wild mysterious landscape with its frightening abysses and gorges, with charming joyful lawns and quiet idyllic corners...” – this is how Arnold Schoenberg recorded his impressions of the symphony's music in one of his letters to Mahler. The large-scale five-movement structure of Gustav Mahler's Fifth Symphony – a long way from the funeral march to the sublime feelings of the famous Adagietto and the seething finale – is a sincere, partly naive, attempt to resolve the tragic conflict with the outside world. The symphony immerses into a world of deep emotions, revealing themes of love, loss and the search for meaning in life.

The concert program will be performed by the NOVAT Symphony Orchestra, as well as with the participation of a special guest, Olga Volkova (violin, St. Petersburg). The music director and conductor is Mikhail Tatarnikov.