PERFORMERS

ORQUESTA SINFÓNICA DE CASTILLA Y LEÓN
Miguel Harth-Bedoya, conductor
Herbert Schuch, piano

WORKS

VIVANCOS: Blau
BEETHOVEN: Piano concerto for piano and orchestra no. 4
NIELSEN: Symphony no. 2

The Concerto for Piano and Orchestra no. 4 in G major is the last one that Beethoven performed live as a soloist, at a marathon concert at the Theater an der Wien that included the Fantasie in C minor, the Fifth and Sixth Symphonies and excerpts from the Mass in C minor. Mendelssohn recovered it in Leipzig in 1836, since when it has surprised as one of the most contemplative of Beethoven's works, with an air of serenity that is highlighted at the start of the Allegro moderato. Premièred in 2006 by the OBC, Blau is wed to the meditative climate of Beethoven's concerto.
In it, composer Bernat Vivancos wanted to describe the feelings of anxiety that a painter feels just before tackling a blank canvas through a ghostly music that seeks to suggest the moments before artistic creation. The Second Symphony (1901-1902) by Carl August Nielsen, subtitled “The Four Temperaments”, is a great breath of fresh Wagnerian air on an emotional programme of four characters: choleric, phlegmatic, melancholic and sanguine. Quite an emotive palette.