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(Pipa (Chinese lute) virtuoso Wu Man (wumanpipa.org)
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Wu Man was the first musician from China to have performed at the White House. This specialist in the pipa, or Chinese lute, is featured during our second hour.
Mikhail Pletnev is the pianist in this evening’s first-hour presentation of Haydn’s Piano Concerto in F, with the German Chamber Philharmonic. Handel’s third “Water Music” suite follows before we head to more modern times and warmer climes. Joaquìn Rodrigo dedicated his 1954 “Fantasia para una gentilhombre” to Andrés Segovia. All of the thematic material is based on music by the 17th-century guitarist and composer, Gaspar Sanz, and Baroque structures abound. The well-known Swedish guitarist, Göran Söllscher, is tonight’s soloist, playing with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra.
Hour two brings you something most unusual: Lou Harrison’s Concerto for Pipa with String Orchestra, the pipa being plucked by a master of this Chinese lute, Wu Man. Harrison, who loved a good tune, said that “Melody is the audience’s take-home pay,” and melody abounds in this seven-movement exploitation of an Asian instrument against a Western orchestra. Mozart’s Trio in C, K 548, fills out the hour in a performance by the Vienna Piano Trio.
Alexander von Zemlinsky is this evening’s birthday honoree (1871). We hear his Symphony No. 2 in B-flat in the second half of our program, Riccardo Chailly conducting the Radio Symphony Orchestra of Berlin. Written in 1897, when the composer was only twenty-six, it shows the clear influence of Brahms, who had died that same year.
Mikhail Pletnev is the pianist in this evening’s first-hour presentation of Haydn’s Piano Concerto in F, with the German Chamber Philharmonic. Handel’s third “Water Music” suite follows before we head to more modern times and warmer climes. Joaquìn Rodrigo dedicated his 1954 “Fantasia para una gentilhombre” to Andrés Segovia. All of the thematic material is based on music by the 17th-century guitarist and composer, Gaspar Sanz, and Baroque structures abound. The well-known Swedish guitarist, Göran Söllscher, is tonight’s soloist, playing with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra.
Hour two brings you something most unusual: Lou Harrison’s Concerto for Pipa with String Orchestra, the pipa being plucked by a master of this Chinese lute, Wu Man. Harrison, who loved a good tune, said that “Melody is the audience’s take-home pay,” and melody abounds in this seven-movement exploitation of an Asian instrument against a Western orchestra. Mozart’s Trio in C, K 548, fills out the hour in a performance by the Vienna Piano Trio.
Alexander von Zemlinsky is this evening’s birthday honoree (1871). We hear his Symphony No. 2 in B-flat in the second half of our program, Riccardo Chailly conducting the Radio Symphony Orchestra of Berlin. Written in 1897, when the composer was only twenty-six, it shows the clear influence of Brahms, who had died that same year.
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