Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 17 in G major, K. 453, takes centre stage in this programme by the Orquestra Simfònica de Barcelona i Nacional de Catalunya (OBC). Italian pianist Saskia Giorgini, artist-in-residence at L’Auditori and winner of the 2016 Mozart International Piano Competition, is the soloist, with Marta Gardolińska conducting.
The programme features three distinct musical styles. Orawa by Polish composer Wojciech Kilar is built around repetitive rhythms and mounting tension, while Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Symphonic Dances bring the concert to a close with expansive melodies and orchestral contrasts. The works span the elegance of the Classical period and the energy of 20th-century music.
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Mozart had a starling that could whistle a theme from his Piano Concerto No. 17. The bird got one note wrong, and Mozart noted the little mistake in his records.
Rachmaninoff composed the Symphonic Dances in 1940, during his exile in the United States. They were his last original composition. Before settling on the final title, he called them Fantastic Dances.
In the score of the Symphonic Dances, Rachmaninoff wrote the word “hallelujah” above one of the final passages. Here, he revisits a religious chant that he had used several years earlier in a choral work.
