Philharmonia Orchestra olv. Esa-Pekka Salonen

!! Hall : Koningin Elisabethzaal - Astridplein 26 - 2018 Antwerpen

The Finnish conductor and composer Esa-Pekka Salonen has many qualities. He is a masterful motivator, is highly socially engaged, and has a constant desire for renewal. After an exceptionally successful eighteen seasons at the Los Angeles Philharmonic, a few years ago Salonen took charge of London’s Philharmonia Orchestra, again to great acclaim. 

Beethoven too was in search of his own sound in his Second Symphony. He enlivened the fossilised traditions of Classicism with a Romantic gloss.

Mahler’s monumental First Symphony, ‘Titan’, is a moving, rather ironic testimony to his ambiguous relationship with German culture: from the sublimation of nature and the folk dance, to a contorted funeral march with gypsy influences, to the folk tune ‘Frère Jacques’ in a minor key. The nickname ‘Titan’ alludes to Jean Paul’s eponymous, semi-autobiographical novel, with which Mahler strongly identified.