Edmonton Symphony Orchestra
Conducted by Jean-Marie Zeitouni
Behzod Abduraimov (piano)
Winspear Centre, Edmonton
Friday, January 27, 2017
Program:
John McPherson: Triune (Grief/Peace/Liberation) (first performance)
Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 5 ‘The Emperor’
Albéric Magnard: Symphony No. 4
Beethoven’s famous Piano Concerto No.5, ‘The Emperor’, completed in 1811, is usually seen – and played – as one of the great works that ushered in the age of Romanticism in music. It also, of course, represented the death-knell of the Classical age, as the young Uzbek pianist Behzod Abduraimov reminded us on Friday in the Edmonton Symphony’s wide-ranging Winspear concert. There was a new work by the orchestra’s composer-in-residence, and a French symphony that probably very few in the audience had ever heard of, let alone heard.
For what Abduraimov gave us – entirely supported by conductor Jean-Marie Zeitouni – was Beethoven’s Fifth Piano Concerto played as a Classical concerto rather than as a Romantic prototype. Continue reading “Edmonton Symphony Orchestra: McPherson, Beethoven, and Magnard”