Inviting Hallé

Britten Britain to America world premiere 20’
Shostakovich Symphony No.7, ‘Leningrad’ 81'

Sir Mark Elder conductor

Few symphonies became so instantly recognisable, indeed so sensationally popular, as Shostakovich’s ‘Leningrad’ Symphony, a work first performed in 1942. With the world in the grip of an unprecedented total conflict, its message of resistance and ultimate victory was soon to provide audiences in both the Soviet Union and the West with a powerful emblem of hope and defiance. Its remarkable ‘Nazi invasion’ episode is music of near-overwhelming power and intensity.

In the first half of the concert new light is thrown on Benjamin Britten with another work dating from 1942 – the music he composed for a series of NBC radio plays.

£3 student tickets 

Are you 26 or under? 
PwC and the Hallé have teamed up to create the PwC Hallé Under 26 ticket. A limited number of stalls seats, usually worth up to £26, are being offered at half price.

Wolfgang Rihm A Tribute (Über die Linie VIII) 20'
Brahms A German Requiem 68'

Markus Stenz conductor | Carolyn Sampson soprano
Neal Davies bass-baritone | Hallé Choir

Principal Guest Conductor Markus Stenz has forged a strong relationship with the Hallé Choir and here directs one of the great masterpieces of the choral repertoire, Brahms’s A German Requiem. Its title aside, the work has an appeal that transcends both national boundaries and religious beliefs (Brahms even considered naming it a ‘Human Requiem’) and it remains a deeply moving experience for audiences everywhere. While its musical language is unmistakably that of Brahms, it also looks back to Bach and to the composers of the Renaissance. Brahms’s progression from suffering to eventual consolation is thus both dramatically and musically fascinating. 

Wolfgang Rihm is a composer who never fails to confound and enthral. The concert opens with his Tribute (Über die Linie VIII), an homage to Benjamin Britten commissioned by the Royal Philharmonic Society and given its world premiere by Sir Mark and the Hallé at the 2013 Aldeburgh Festival.

This event celebrates the Royal Philharmonic Society Bicentenary 1813-2013

£3 student tickets 

Are you 26 or under? 
PwC and the Hallé have teamed up to create the PwC Hallé Under 26 ticket. A limited number of stalls seats, usually worth up to £26, are being offered at half price.

 

Stravinsky Symphonies of wind instruments (1947) 10'
Mendelssohn Violin Concerto 29'
Tchaikovsky Symphony No.5 47'

Sir Mark Elder conductor | Alina Ibragimova violin

‘In a world bursting with brilliant young female violinists, Ibragimova is something special’ wrote The Daily Telegraph of tonight’s soloist. She returns to the Hallé for Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto, a wonderful fusion of romantic melodiousness and classical restraint with a lullaby slow movement and a quite brilliant finale.

After the interval Sir Mark conducts Tchaikovsky’s popular Fifth Symphony, a work in which a ‘fate motif’ recurs in fascinatingly different guises. The symphony is a glorious journey from darkness to light with a wealth of sumptuous themes along the way. 

First in the concert is Stravinsky’s Symphonies of wind instruments. Its chant-like qualities suggest the incense-shrouded rituals of the Russian Orthodox Church.

£3 student tickets 

Are you 26 or under? 
PwC and the Hallé have teamed up to create the PwC Hallé Under 26 ticket. A limited number of stalls seats, usually worth up to £26, are being offered at half price.

 

Elgar Overture: In the South (Alassio) 20'
Ravel Piano Concerto in G 22’
Dvorák Symphony No. 7 41’

Andrew Gourlay conductor | Hong Xu piano

Andrew Gourlay is one in a succession of former Hallé Assistant Conductors now forging ahead in the musical world. On his return to Manchester he is joined by the brilliant Hong Xu for Ravel’s wonderfully jazz-inspired Piano Concerto in G. The slow movement is one of the most gorgeous in the whole of French music. 

We continue to mark the bicentenary of the RPS with a masterpiece commissioned by that body in 1884, Dvorák’s dark-hued Seventh Symphony. Clearly influenced by the Third Symphony of his friend and mentor Brahms, it is nevertheless a very Czech work with a stirring finale rallying call of a finale to Dvorák’s compatriots in the face of Austro - Hungarian oppression.

The concert springs into life with Elgar’s great tribute to Italy, his inspirational In the South Overture.

This event celebrates the Royal Philharmonic Society Bicentenary 1813-2013

£3 student tickets 

Are you 26 or under? 
PwC and the Hallé have teamed up to create the PwC Hallé Under 26 ticket. A limited number of stalls seats, usually worth up to £26, are being offered at half price.

 

Wagner Overture: Tannhäuser 15'

R. Strauss Lied including Op.51, No.1: Das Thal and Op.51, No.2: Der Einsame 26'
Sibelius Symphony No.1 42'

Nikolaj Znaider conductor
Alexander Vinogradov bass

Nikolaj Znaider opens a scintillating programme – the first concert in the much anticipated ‘Strauss’s Voice’ series – with Wagner’s stirring overture to Tannhäuser.

Russian bass Alexander Vinogradov is fast becoming a major vocal star. His richly sonorous bass voice is the ideal medium for Strauss’s most evocative orchestral songs, the orchestrations of which are fascinatingly responsive to the poetic texts they set. ‘Das Thal’ (The Valley) is an affectionate celebration of nature, while ‘Der Einsame’ (The Lonesome One) explores the darkest reaches of the human soul. 

The influence of Tchaikovsky can be clearly discerned in Sibelius’s First Symphony and particularly in the heart-on-sleeve lyricism of its glorious finale.

£3 student tickets 

Are you 26 or under? 
PwC and the Hallé have teamed up to create the PwC Hallé Under 26 ticket. A limited number of stalls seats, usually worth up to £26, are being offered at half price.

 

R. Strauss Festival Prelude 12'
R. Strauss Lied: Op.44, No.1: Notturno 16'
R. Strauss Lied: Op.44, No.2: Nächtlicher Gang 6'
R. Strauss Eine Alpensinfonie 50'

Juanjo Mena conductor
Roderick Williams baritone

Manchester’s celebration of Richard Strauss continues in grand style with an exhilarating concert in which the Hallé and BBC Philharmonic join forces. Strauss’s Festival Prelude is a striking orchestral gesture that also features the mighty Bridgewater Hall organ.

Acclaimed baritone Roderick Williams then makes the first of two appearances this season with Strauss’s Opus 44 songs. ‘Notturno’ is an expressionistic portrayal of the macabre figure of Fiddling Death that musically looks forward to Strauss’s great operas Elektra and Salome. ‘Nächtlicher Gang’ (Night March) takes us into the realm of nightmares, its ingenious orchestration is one of howling horns, rattling castanets and a skeletal xylophone. 

In the second half Juanjo Mena and the Hallé/BBC team make a glorious Alpine ascent. As their intrepid journey unfolds they encounter a waterfall, a storm and much else, all vividly rendered in Strauss’s astonishing score.

£3 student tickets 

Are you 26 or under? 
PwC and the Hallé have teamed up to create the PwC Hallé Under 26 ticket. A limited number of stalls seats, usually worth up to £26, are being offered at half price.

 

Britten Peter Grimes: Four Sea Interludes and Passacaglia 23'
Ryan Wigglesworth Violin Concerto world premiere 20'
Berlioz Overture: Le Roi Lear 16'
Debussy La Mer (Three Symphonic Sketches) 23'

Ryan Wigglesworth conductor
Barnabas Kelemen violin

Ryan Wigglesworth makes his Hallé concert debut with the Four Sea Interludes and Passacaglia from Britten’s great opera Peter Grimes. In these evocative works, the North Sea is as important (and unfathomable) a character as Grimes himself. 

Ravel Mother Goose (complete ballet music) 25'
R. Strauss Orchestral Songs 24'
Beethoven Symphony No.7 38'

Sir Mark Elder conductor | Steve Davislim tenor

Once upon a time … 

MacCunn Overture: The Land of the Mountain and the Flood 9'
Dowland/Purcell Suite of English music 12'
Britten Lachrymae 15'
Mendelssohn Symphony No.3, ‘Scottish’ 40'

Andrew Manze conductor | Timothy Pooley viola

Among much else Andrew Manze is a distinguished interpreter of early music. To complement Britten’s string arrangement of Purcell’s majestic Chacony, Manze has made two further adaptations of works by Dowland and Purcell to form an attractive suite of early English music. 

Dowland was the inspiration for Britten’s Lachrymae, a series of shadowy musical reflections for viola and strings with one of the most moving endings ever written. 

Framing this glorious English music are two conspicuously Caledonian works. Hamish MacCunn’s The Land of the Mountain and the Flood is an evocative musical counterpart to the popular Scottish landscape paintings of its time. Finally Manze renders Mendelssohn’s ‘Scottish Symphony’ as fresh and limpid as a highland stream.

£3 student tickets 

Are you 26 or under? 
PwC and the Hallé have teamed up to create the PwC Hallé Under 26 ticket. A limited number of stalls seats, usually worth up to £26, are being offered at half price.

Bartók The Miraculous Mandarin 32'
John Casken Oboe Concerto world premiere 20'
Weill The Seven Deadly Sins 39'

Sir Mark Elder conductor | Stéphane Rancourt oboe

A thrilling work of musical theatre, Weill’s The Seven Deadly Sins, the composer’s last major collaboration with Bertolt Brecht, is a great modern parable about the evils of greed and capitalism. Singers and a dancer take us from one American city to another, and from one sin to the next, envying, lusting and covetting with splendid impunity. 

The split personality of the ‘sinner’, Anna, is played by a dancer (her soul) and a singer (her rational side). Her mother is played by the bass, the baritone is her father and the two tenors are her brothers. 

By the time Anna has succeeded in sending enough money to build the family home, the dancer in her has been destroyed. Bartók’s hard-edged The Miraculous Mandarin portrays the seamy side of human nature. Strongly influenced by Stravinsky’s great The Rite of Spring, it is a sordid story of seduction and murder with more than a hint of the supernatural. 

Among all the wantonness, the Hallé’s exceptional (and invariably virtuous) Stéphane Rancourt gives the world premiere of another major new Hallé commission, John Casken’s Oboe Concerto.

£3 student tickets 

Are you 26 or under? 
PwC and the Hallé have teamed up to create the PwC Hallé Under 26 ticket. A limited number of stalls seats, usually worth up to £26, are being offered at half price.