Tour: Montpellier

Three icons of Romanticism, an emotional intermezzo, a world-famous violin concerto and the sounds of the Rhein will make up the program of the Budapest Festival Orchestra in Montpellier. The first notes of the concert will be played in a commemoration: Brahms’s lament seeking calm will be performed in the orchestration and in memory of Victor Aviat, principal oboist of the orchestra, who passed away in May. The Mendelssohn concerto in the middle, comprising a challenging opening movement, a lyrical aria and a finale evoking A Midsummer Night’s Dream will feature the soloist Renaud Capuçon, a returning guest artist for the BFO. The former concertmaster of Claudio Abbado will use his 1737 Guarnieri violin to share the deep and nuanced tones of the piece, while displaying the virtuosity which makes him a favorite of audiences and critics. The program will conclude with a Schumann symphony inspired by pleasant experiences and calling to mind a peaceful riverside excursion.

In the Scottish ballad, Lady Anne Bothwell is lamenting her fate while soothing her son to sleep. After being abandoned by her unfaithful lover, she now has to bring up her child, born outside of marriage, alone and in disgrace. In the lines serving as the refrain at the end of each stanza, Lady Anne interrupts her story to lull her son. The refrain is printed at the top of Brahms’s intermezzo, and this bittersweet atmosphere, the mixture of pain and soothing, anger and calming permeates the opening piece of the series originally composed for piano. The composition, written and published in 1892, is a peaceful andante characterized by an intricate interplay of the inner and outer parts, and this time enhanced by orchestral tones.

After his violin concerto, written at the age of 13 and considered quite a nice attempt, it took Mendelssohn more than a decade and a half to return to the genre. However, the composition was hindered by illnesses and other works, so the piece was only completed in 1845. Ferdinand David, the composer’s violinist friend, helped him with technical issues throughout the process, and became also the dedicatee of the work. The result was the last major orchestral piece by Mendelssohn, a violin concerto with a simple structure, but which is also highly innovative. Instead of an orchestral introduction, the soloist starts right away at the beginning of the first movement, even playing the virtuoso cadenza before it would be suggested by the form of the movement. It is not only the violinist who is impatient in this concerto: the three movements follow one another without pause, linked by different passages. After the slow movement, evoking the world of Songs Without Words, the piece concludes with a joyous finale, introduced with a fanfare of trumpets.

Schumann’s appointment as musical director in Düsseldorf helped him recover from a difficult period in his life. After a pleasant trip with his wife around his new home in the Rhineland, his experiences inspired him to write a symphony entitled “A Piece of Life in Rhineland”. Though he later retracted the program, the epithet “Rhenish” stuck. Although Schumann's symphony is numbered as the third, it was actually the fourth he completed. Conducted by the composer at its 1851 premiere, the piece received mixed reactions from contemporary audiences. The nature music of the first movement opening with a heroic theme is followed by a moderately paced movement with a ländler and a drinking song, which is a mixture of a Scherzo and the variation form. This is followed by a slow movement exuding calm with static harmony and understated orchestration without timpani and brass winds. Schumann inserted an additional movement before the finale. The solemn, archaistic music inspired by the Cologne Cathedral and called the “Cathedral” movement, is infused with trombones. The piece concludes with a light dance-like finale, bringing back the cheerful atmosphere of the opening movement.