CHRIST ON THE MOUNT OF OLIVES

Sunday 19 January 2020 7–9.05pm Thursday 13 February 2020 7.30–9.35pm Barbican

LSO SEASON CONCERT CHRIST ON THE MOUNT OF OLIVES

Berg Violin Concerto Interval Beethoven Christ on the Mount of Olives

Sir Simon Rattle conductor Lisa Batiashvili violin

Elsa Dreisig soprano

Pavol Breslik tenor

David Soar bass

London Symphony Chorus

Simon Halsey chorus director

Part of Beethoven 250 at the Barbican

Thursday 13 February 2020 broadcast live on BBC Radio 3

2 Welcome

Welcome Latest Newswill be recorded for LSO Live, the Orchestra is also joined by the full force of the London Symphony Chorus, led by Chorus Director Simon Halsey.

Berg’s Violin Concerto opens these concerts, for which we welcome soloist Lisa Batiashvili, who first performed with the Orchestra on the Barbican stage in 2006, and has appeared regularly in recent years. We look forward to Lisa Batiashvili joining us on tour for further performances of this concerto in Europe.

We extend thanks to our media partners BBC Radio 3, who will broadcast the second performance live.

I hope you enjoy these performances and that you are able to join us again soon. At the end of January, LSO Principal Guest Conductor Gianandrea Noseda resumes his Shostakovich cycle with the Ninth Symphony, recorded for LSO Live. Later in February, Elim Chan conducts a programme featuring Ravel’s Daphnis and Chloe and Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto No 3, with Lukáš Vondráček. •

Kathryn McDowell CBE DL Managing Director

warm welcome to these LSO concerts, conducted by Music Director Sir Simon Rattle, where

we continue our year-long celebrations of the 250th anniversary of Beethoven’s birth, as part of a wider series at the Barbican. Throughout January and February, Sir Simon pairs the music of this great composer with that of a 20th-century master, Alban Berg.

In these concerts, Sir Simon conducts Beethoven’s only oratorio, Christ on the Mount of Olives. These performances are the first in the Orchestra’s history, and an opportunity to hear a rarely performed work in Beethoven’s anniversary year. It is a pleasure to welcome soloists Elsa Dreisig and David Soar, both making their LSO debut, and Pavol Breslik, in his first performance with the Orchestra since 2006. For these eagerly anticipated performances, which

19 January & 13 February 2020

DONATELLA FLICK LSO CONDUCTING COMPETITION

Applications are now open for the 16th Donatella Flick LSO Conducting Competition in 2021, founded in 1990 by Donatella Flick and celebrating its 30th anniversary this year.

•  lso.co.uk/more/news

WELCOME TO OUR GROUP BOOKERS

Academy Travel Groups of ten or more receive exclusive discounts to LSO concerts, with 20% off tickets, or 30% off when booking two or more concerts within the season at the same time. Extra benefits are available to larger groups. Find out more at •  lso.co.uk/groups

On Our BlogLUNAR NEW YEAR PREMIERES: LSO DISCOVERY COMPOSERS PAST AND PRESENT

Following a sold-out debut in January 2019, artist collective Tangram return to LSO St Luke’s on 25 January to interweave folk melodies with brand-new compositions. We caught up with composers Raymond Yiu, Jasmin Kent Rodgman and Alex Ho – all LSO Discovery composers of past and present – to find out more about the music we’ll hear on Lunar New Year.

SPRING’S CLASSIC FM RECOMMENDED CONCERTS

At the LSO, we are proud to have been Classic FM’s Orchestra in the City of London for over 17 years. Each season, a selection of our concerts come recommended by Classic FM. Don’t miss our round-up of spring’s suggested concerts and a look at where the music – and more – sit in the LSO’s history.

•  lso.co.uk/more/blog

Please ensure all phones are switched off. Photography and audio/video recording are not permitted during the performance.

3Tonight’s Concert

Tonight’s Concert In Brief / by Paul Griffiths

A sombre prelude sets the scene, on the night Jesus is arrested. Jesus prays to God to save him from the test, to which an Angel responds by leading the chorus in praise of him. The two solo voices come together, and the soldiers arrive, to the disciples’ alarm. Peter draws his sword, but Jesus has him hold back. There is another duet for Jesus and the Angel before the final chorus. •

PROGRAMME CONTRIBUTORS

Paul Griffiths has been a critic for nearly 40 years, including for The Times and The New Yorker, and is an authority on 20th and 21st-century music. Among his books are studies of Boulez, Ligeti and Stravinsky. He also writes novels and librettos.

Andrew Stewart is a freelance music journalist and writer. He is the author of The LSO at 90, and contributes to a wide variety of specialist classical music publications.

Lindsay Kemp is a senior producer for BBC Radio 3, including programming lunchtime concerts at Wigmore Hall and LSO St Luke’s. He is also Artistic Advisor to York Early Music Festival, Artistic Director of Baroque at the Edge Festival and a regular contributor to Gramophone magazine.

oth works in this concert look back to great predecessors: Bach in the Berg Violin Concerto, Handel in

the oratorio by Beethoven. Berg inscribed his concerto ‘To the Memory of an Angel’, following the death at 18 of Manon Gropius, daughter of Alma Mahler and her second husband, the architect Walter Gropius. The first of the two movements is appropriately diaphanous as it starts, suspended between the ladder of fifths to which the violin is tuned and a twelve-note row. It then turns into a country dance.

The second movement goes the other way, from fast to slow, and more extremely. It begins with the catastrophe of death, out of which the solo instrument leads the way with a chorale tune, ‘Es ist genug’ (‘It is enough’). This is then heard in a harmonisation by Bach, on clarinets, and remains to the end. Manon is taken to her rest, but Berg is also telling other stories here, of his own teenage years, when he made a kitchen maid pregnant, and of his current love affair, doomed because both those involved were already married.

Beethoven wrote his only oratorio, Christ on the Mount of Olives, in 1803 for the concert at which he also presented his Second Symphony and Third Piano Concerto.

Coming UpFriday 24 & 31 January 1pm LSO St Luke’s

BBC RADIO 3 LUNCHTIME CONCERT BACH UP CLOSE

Discover the idiosyncrasies of Bach’s chamber music with intimate performances from soloists and ensembles.

Recorded for future broadcast by BBC Radio 3

Thursday 30 January 7.30pm Barbican

SHOSTAKOVICH NINTH SYMPHONY

Prokofiev Symphony No 1, ‘Classical’ Mozart Violin Concerto No 3 Mussorgsky Prelude to ‘Khovanshchina’ Shostakovich Symphony No 9 Gianandrea Noseda conductor Christian Tetzlaff  violin

6pm Barbican LSO Platforms: Guildhall Artists Free pre-concert recital

Saturday 15 February 7pm LSO St Luke’s

LSO DISCOVERY SOUNDHUB SHOWCASE: PHASE II

Composers on Phase II of LSO Discovery’s Soundhub scheme showcase new music, joined by LSO musicians. LSO Soundhub is generously supported by

Susie Thomson

Thursday 27 February 7.30pm Barbican

DAPHNIS AND CHLOE

James Hoyle Thymiaterion (world premiere) * Rachmaninov Piano Concerto No 3 Elizabeth Ogonek All These Lighted Things – three little dances for orchestra Ravel Daphnis and Chloe – Suite No 2 Elim Chan conductor Lukáš Vondráček  piano

*Commissioned through the Panufnik Composers

Scheme, generously supported by Lady Hamlyn and The Helen Hamlyn Trust

4 Beethoven 250 at the Barbican 19 January & 13 February 2020

Beethoven 250 at the Barbican / by Dr Joanne Cormac

Beethoven is the ultimate creative genius. He epitomises the popular, romanticised image of the great composer. Beethoven suffered. He was taciturn, isolated, and lacking in social graces. He endured the worst affliction imaginable for a musician: deafness. In spite of all this (many, including Wagner, would argue because of all this), he managed to compose some of the most breathtaking, transcendental, sublime music of the Western canon. At first, the composer's deafness was understood as a barrier to his compositional prowess: the reason for the bizarre, jarring sounds of the late string quartets. Later, it was seen as the key to his greatness, enabling Beethoven to access profound, inward truths. Living through turbulent revolutionary times, Beethoven was an advocate for political reform. He saw a power shift away from the aristocracy. His political beliefs were more ambivalent and changeable than his mythology allows, but Beethoven’s music has come to represent resistance against tyranny and oppression, and the defence of individual freedom, equality and radical

This season the Barbican, London Symphony Orchestra, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Academy of Ancient Music and Guildhall School of Music & Drama celebrate 250 years since the birth of Ludwig van Beethoven. But what is his relevance today?

social change. It is a powerful symbol of hope, revisited in times of political struggle, a celebration of freedom and brotherhood.

The popular image can be problematic. Beethoven’s vocal and choral music, or simply the works that do not contain journeys of struggle to redemption, are rarely performed because they do not comply with our perception of the heroic, suffering artist. The Barbican’s innovative, inclusive and occasionally irreverent programme, in contrast, will question the myths. The Beethoven we hear will be refreshingly unfamiliar at times.

Beethoven’s music endures. Its universal themes mean that it remains relevant to almost any time and place. It has been heard in prisons, concentration camps, at the fall of the Berlin Wall, in films, and in venues across the globe. Now, 250 years after his birth, Beethoven belongs to everyone. And that is something to celebrate. • Explore the whole series online •  barbican.org.uk/beethoven250

COMING UP AT THE BARBICAN Saturday 1 to Sunday 2 February BEETHOVEN WEEKENDER Nine symphonies. Five orchestras. One extraordinary weekend celebrating the original musical trailblazer. Sponsored by DHL

Thursday 6 February 7.30pm EVGENY KISSIN PLAYS BEETHOVEN Beethoven Piano Sonata No 8 Op 13 15 Variations and a Fugue Op 35 Piano Sonata No 17 Op 31 Piano Sonata No 21 Op 53

Thursday 27 February 7.30pm Milton Court Concert Hall THE LAST THREE PIANO SONATAS Beethoven Piano Sonata No 30 in E major Op 109 Piano Sonata No 31 in A-flat major Op 110 Piano Sonata No 32 in C minor Op 111 Ronan O'Hora piano

Promoted by Guildhall School of Music & Drama

Soprano Elsa Dreisig follows her debut album Miroir(s) with a recital of songs in collaboration with pianist Jonathan Ware.Taking its title, Morgen, from one of Richard Strauss’s best-loved lieder, it interweaves his music (notably the Four Last Songs)

with thematically linked works by Sergey Rachmaninov and Henri Duparc.

ELSA DREISIGON ERATO

Elsa Dreisig v2.indd 1 18/11/2019 15:35

Soprano Elsa Dreisig follows her debut album Miroir(s) with a recital of songs in collaboration with pianist Jonathan Ware.Taking its title, Morgen, from one of Richard Strauss’s best-loved lieder, it interweaves his music (notably the Four Last Songs)

with thematically linked works by Sergey Rachmaninov and Henri Duparc.

ELSA DREISIGON ERATO

Elsa Dreisig v2.indd 1 18/11/2019 15:35

6 Programme Notes 19 January & 13 February 2020

Alban Berg Violin Concerto 1936 / note by Paul Griffiths

•  LÄNDLER

Popular in Austria and Bavaria at the end of the 18th century, the Ländler is a folk dance in 3/4 time featuring hopping and stamping. With the growing popularity of dance halls in 19th-century Europe, the Ländler became both quicker and more elegant. Berg not only quotes a Ländler in his Violin Concerto, but also in the second act of his opera Wozzeck.

1 Andante – Allegretto 2 Allegro – Adagio

Lisa Batiashvili violin

n February 1935, Berg was visited in Vienna by a man with a mission: Louis Krasner, a violinist born in

Ukraine and raised in the US, was determined to get a concerto out of the composer. Berg, at a time when his music’s prospects in Germany looked dubious, might well have warmed to this invitation from across the Atlantic. In any event, he put his opera Lulu on hold and turned to Krasner’s concerto.

Quite soon, in April 1935, there was a sad loss within Berg’s circle, that of Manon Gropius, the 18-year-old daughter of Mahler’s widow, Alma, and her second husband, Walter Gropius, architect and founder of the Bauhaus school. Elias Canetti recalled how Manon ‘radiated timidity even more than beauty, an angelic gazelle’, and Berg decided to memorialise her in his concerto. This luminous being would be at once described and enacted by the violin, in a work to be subtitled: ‘To the memory of an angel’.

More than one angel, however, sings wordlessly in Berg’s music. Telling the story of Alma’s daughter, Berg remembered his own child, born of his teenage liaison with a kitchen maid at his family’s summer place in Carinthia. At the same time, the concerto draws electricity from his passionate involvement with the sister of Alma Mahler’s husband, the writer Franz Werfel: Hanna Fuchs-Robettin as she then was, married to a businessman and living in Prague. Her initials and the composer’s are musically woven into the score, as are numbers Berg associated with each of them. The calamity that overtakes the concerto is partly that of the death of an angelic adolescent, partly that of an impossible love.

For paradoxes of grief and adoration, Berg found a perfect language in Schoenberg’s twelve-note technique, wielded so that it could embrace the most basic musical situations – even the tuning, in fifths, of the four strings of the solo instrument. Prompted by harp and clarinets, this is how the violin enters. Soon the soloist plays the twelve-note row, rising and falling; similar ascents and descents recur through the work. As the tuning idea returns, the music prepares a smooth transition into

the second part of this first movement, a Ländler •, or country waltz, which turns to a Carinthian folk song. After a hectic period of looking back on itself, the movement arrives at a point of rest.

Any peace is immediately broken by the start of the second movement – in two parts like the first, but with their difference in speed reversed and exaggerated. The first part, fast, is marked ‘free, like a cadenza’, and its outer sections are violent, post-catastrophic, held with increasing firmness to a menacing rhythmic gesture.

Once the storm has passed, the violin is discovered leading the way into the finale with a chorale tune: ‘Es ist genug’ (‘It is enough’). This is where we meet Bach again, for the melody is repeated in a harmonisation of his, played by clarinets, as if by a small organ, and remains omnipresent, spreading its benediction as the work moves to a close.

Less than four months after Manon’s death, the concerto was finished. By the end of the year, Berg himself was no more. •

Interval – 20 minutes There are bars on all levels. Visit the Barbican Shop to see our range of gifts and accessories.

7Composer Profile

Alban Berg In Profile 1885–1935 / profile by Andrew Stewart

lthough piano lessons formed part of Berg’s general education, the boy showed few signs of

exceptional talent for music. He struggled to pass his final exams at the Vienna Gymnasium, preferring to learn directly about new trends in art, literature, music and architecture from friends such as Oskar Kokoschka, Gustav Klimt and Adolf Loos.

On graduating from school, Berg accepted a post as a local government official, but in October 1904 was inspired by a newspaper advertisement to study composition with

Arnold Schoenberg. He studied for six years with Schoenberg, who remained his close friend and mentor. During this time Schoenberg evolved a new approach to composing, gradually moving away from the norms of tonal harmony.

In 1910, Berg completed his String Quartet Op 3, in which he revealed an independent creative flair. Berg’s self-confidence grew with the composition of several miniature works and, in 1914, the large-scale Three Pieces for Orchestra. Service with the Austrian Imperial Army during World War I did not completely halt Berg’s output; indeed, he began his first opera, Wozzeck, in the summer of 1917. The work was premiered at the Staatsoper Berlin in December 1925 and, despite hostile early criticism, has since entered the international repertoire. As an innovative composer, Berg successfully married atonality – and, later, a harmonic and melodic language based on the use of all twelve tones of the chromatic scale – with forms from the past. Traces of popular music also surface in his works, notably so in his opera Lulu (1929–35), a powerful tale of immorality, completed from the composer’s sketches only after the death of his widow in 1976. Berg himself died of septicaemia, almost certainly caused by complications following an insect bite. •

7Composer Profile

Wednesday 18 March 6.30pm Barbican HALF SIX FIX THE WOODEN PRINCE François-Xavier Roth conductor & presenter

Recommended by Classic FM

Thursday 19 March 7.30pm Barbican THE WOODEN PRINCE Bartók Dance Suite Stravinsky Violin Concerto in D major Bartók The Wooden Prince François-Xavier Roth conductor

Isabelle Faust violin

6pm Barbican: Free pre-concert recital LSO Platforms: Guildhall Artists

Wednesday 22 April 6.30pm Barbican HALF SIX FIX CONCERTO FOR ORCHESTRA Sir Simon Rattle conductor & presenter

Recommended by Classic FM

Thursday 23 April 7.30pm Barbican DUKE BLUEBEARD’S CASTLE Bartók Concerto for Orchestra Bartók Duke Bluebeard’s Castle Sir Simon Rattle conductor

Rinat Shaham mezzo-soprano

Gábor Bretz bass lso.co.uk/201920

BARTÓKWITH FRANÇOIS-XAVIER ROTH & SIR SIMON RATTLE

8 Programme Notes 19 January & 13 February 2020

Ludwig van Beethoven Christ on the Mount of Olives 1803 / note by Lindsay Kemp

unsent letter to his brothers in which he revealed his growing sense of isolation and despair. It is not hard to see how Christ’s spiritual suffering, human terror of death and eventual resolve to embrace his fate could have stirred Beethoven’s imagination.

Listening to the opening scene of Christ on the Mount of Olives, in which Christ’s dread is most crushingly expressed, it is easy to be reminded of Florestan’s great monologue from the depths of his prison cell at the start of Act 2 of Fidelio, the opera that three years later would eventually emerge as the great result of Beethoven’s theatrical residency. Indeed it seems that while in Christ on the Mount of Olives, Beethoven was testing out his skills as a choral writer (the fugal writing at the end of the Seraph’s first aria is a dutiful nod to convention, if nonetheless a skilful one), he was more importantly also finding the musical dramatist in him fighting to get out. The powerful, orchestrally driven accompanied recitatives; the characterisation of the Seraph with soaring, ‘superhuman’ coloratura, theatrically-striking moments, such as the sacerdotal trombones that accompany the Seraph’s pronouncement of Jehovah’s words; the chorus of soldiers apparently careless of the momentousness of the events they are enacting; Christ’s final shudder of terror

1 Introduction 2 Recitative: Jehova, O my Father 3 Aria: My soul within me trembles 4 Recitative: Now tremble, Nature 5 Aria: Praise the Redeemer’s goodness 6 Chorus: O praise him, great Redeemer 7 Recitative: Seraph, can you declare the mercy 8 Duet: On me then falls this heavy burden 9 Recitative: Then welcome, death 10  Chorus: We surely here will find him 11 Recitative: Those sent to catch me now are close 12 Chorus: Here he is 13 Recitative: We cannot stand aside 14 Trio: My beating heart is angry 15 Chorus: Hallelujah unto God’s Almighty son 16 Chorus: Praise the Lord, you bright angelic choirs Elsa Dreisig soprano

Pavol Breslik tenor

David Soar bass

London Symphony Chorus

Simon Halsey chorus director

n 1803, Beethoven had written very little choral music. Though he had produced two symphonies, three

piano concertos, his first six string quartets and some of his best-known piano sonatas,

his only choral compositions of significance had been two cantatas written in 1790 to mark the death of Emperor Joseph II on the one hand, and the succession of Leopold II on the other. They showed promise, but neither is known to have received a performance.

His return to choral music 13 years later came perhaps as much out of circumstance as compulsion. Early in 1803, Beethoven moved into lodgings in the Theater an der Wien, the largest theatre in Vienna, at the invitation of the management. The plan was for him to compose an opera, but progress was slow, and in any case, access to an orchestra and chorus had offered a separate opportunity waiting to be acted upon. On 5 April, Beethoven mounted a concert that included the long-awaited premieres of his Second Symphony and Third Piano Concerto. Also on the bill was an oratorio, Christus am Ölberge (Christ on the Mount of Olives), composed especially for the occasion in the space of only a few weeks.

To enter the field of the oratorio cannot have been a casual decision, however. It was a serious genre considered worthy to express the most profound and elevated sentiments, and in Vienna its importance was as strong as anywhere. Handel’s oratorios had been performed there since the 1770s, and by the time of Christ on the Mount of Olives

the scene was dominated by Haydn’s The Creation (1798) and The Seasons (1801). Beethoven was fully aware of the greatness of both these composers, and it may indeed have been to avoid comparison with them that for his own first effort he turned to a more intimately focused subject – Christ’s soul-searching in the Garden of Gethsemane just before his arrest. In so doing, he was also tapping into a strong German 18th-century canon of concert oratorios on religious subjects, with texts by Enlightenment-inspired poets such as Klopstock, Ramler and Herder; the libretto of Christ on the Mount of Olives was by the busy Viennese librettist, and kindred spirit, Franz Xaver Huber. What Beethoven was not doing was following the Lutheran tradition of church Passions narrated through gospel texts – like most people at the time, he would not have even known its two greatest examples, Bach’s St John Passion and St Matthew Passion.

Beethoven may also have been touched on a personal level by Christ’s contemplation of his forthcoming crucifixion. The previous summer, he had spent time in the Viennese suburb of Heiligenstadt recovering from a mental crisis brought on by the realisation of the implications of his oncoming deafness. There he wrote the heartrending document known as the Heiligenstadt Testament, an

9Composer Profile

Ludwig van Beethoven In Profile 1770–1827

eethoven showed early musical promise, yet reacted against his father’s attempts to train him as

a child prodigy. The boy pianist attracted the endorsement of the Prince-Archbishop, who supported his studies with leading musicians at the Bonn court. By the early 1780s, Beethoven had completed his first compositions, all of which were for keyboard. With the decline of his alcoholic father, Ludwig became the family breadwinner as a musician at court.

Encouraged by his employer, the Prince-Archbishop Maximilian Franz, Beethoven travelled to Vienna to study with Joseph

Haydn. The younger composer fell out with his renowned mentor when the latter discovered he was secretly taking lessons from several other teachers. Although Maximilian Franz withdrew payments for Beethoven’s Viennese education, the talented musician had already attracted support from some of the city’s wealthiest arts patrons. His public performances in 1795 were well received, and he shrewdly negotiated a contract with Artaria & Co, the largest music publisher in Vienna. He was soon able to devote his time to composition or the performance of his own works.

In 1800, Beethoven began to complain bitterly of deafness, but despite suffering the distress and pain of tinnitus, liver problems, chronic stomach ailments and an embittered legal case for the guardianship of his nephew, Beethoven created a series of remarkable new works, including the Missa Solemnis and his late symphonies and piano sonatas. It is thought that around 10,000 people followed his funeral procession on 29 March 1827. Certainly, his posthumous reputation developed to influence successive generations of composers and other artists inspired by the heroic aspects of Beethoven’s character and the profound humanity of his music. • Profile by Andrew Stewart

•  MORE BEETHOVEN THIS SEASON Thursday 28 May 7.30pm Barbican BEETHOVEN & STRAUSS Beethoven Violin Concerto Strauss Ein Heldenleben Manfred Honeck conductor Anne-Sophie Mutter violin

6pm Barbican LSO Platforms: Guildhall Artists Free pre-concert recital Part of Beethoven 250 at the Barbican

•  ON LSO LIVE

Bernard Haitink conductor

just before his discovery by them; and the clearly contrasted reactions of the soldiers and disciples to the arrest all show a sure touch for operatic incident and colour. And if the trio in which Christ emerges from his passivity to deter Peter from taking violent revenge seems more a functional episode than a convincingly dramatic one, the way it links the previous active events to the final Handelian chorus of celebrating angels helps to create an overall trajectory for the work – from private introspection to public rejoicing – that indeed foretells that of Fidelio’s decisive second act.

Christ on the Mount of Olives was a moderate success at its premiere, and received further performances during its composer’s lifetime. Since then, it has passed out of the repertory, replaced in the Beethovenian choral pantheon by later masterpieces. These two rare performances are a welcome opportunity to discover Beethoven developing not only the skills that informed and enabled the greatness of Fidelio, the Missa Solemnis and the Ninth Symphony, but the idea of artistic self-identification that would present itself in his next major work, the ‘Eroica’ Symphony. •

10 Artist Biographies 19 January & 13 February 2020

Sir Simon Rattle conductor

productions of Beethoven’s Fidelio, Mozart’s Così fan tutte, Britten’s Peter Grimes, Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande, Strauss’ Salome and Bizet’s Carmen, all with the Berlin Philharmonic. He also conducted Wagner’s complete Ring cycle with the Berlin Philharmonic for the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence and Salzburg Osterfestspiele, and most recently at the Deutsche Oper Berlin and the Wiener Staatsoper. Other recent opera productions include Tristan and Isolde at the Metropolitan Opera in New York; Pelléas et Mélisande and Poulenc’s Les Dialogues des Carmélites at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden; Rameau’s Hippolyte et Aricie, Janáček’s Aus einem Totenhaus and Káťa Kabanová and The Damnation of Faust for the Deutsche Staatsoper Berlin; and Puccini’s Manon Lescaut at the Deutsche Oper Berlin.

As well as fulfilling a taxing concert schedule in London, Sir Simon regularly tours within Europe, North America and Asia, and has strong longstanding relationships with the world’s leading orchestras. Initially working closely with the Los Angeles Philharmonic and Boston Symphony Orchestras, Simon has also recently worked with the Philadelphia Orchestra and the Metropolitan Opera in New York. He regularly conducts the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen

ir Simon Rattle was born in Liverpool and studied at the Royal Academy of Music.

From 1980 to 1998, Sir Simon was Principal Conductor and Artistic Adviser of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and was appointed Music Director in 1990. In 2002, he took up the position of Artistic Director and Chief Conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic where he remained until the end of the 2017/18 season. Sir Simon took up the position of Music Director of the London Symphony Orchestra in September 2017.

Sir Simon has made over 70 recordings for the record label EMI (now Warner Classics) and has received numerous prestigious international awards for his recordings on various labels. Releases on EMI include Stravinsky’s Symphony of Psalms (which received a Grammy Award for Best Choral Performance), Berlioz’s Symphonie fantastique, Ravel’s L’enfant et les sortilèges, Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker Suite, Mahler’s Symphony No 2, Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring and Rachmaninov’s The Bells and Symphonic Dances, all recorded with the Berlin Philharmonic. Sir Simon’s most recent recordings include Berlioz’s The Damnation of Faust, Helen Grime’s Woven Space, Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande and Mark-Anthony Turnage’s Remembering, which were all released by LSO Live.

Between 2013 and 2018, Sir Simon and the Berlin Philharmonic took up residency at Baden-Baden Osterfestspiele, performing a variety of operatic and symphonic repertoire. Past seasons included Puccini’s Manon Lescaut and Peter Sellars’ ritualisation of Bach’s St John Passion, Strauss’ Der Rosenkavalier, Berlioz’s The Damnation of Faust, Wagner’s Tristan and Isolde and, most recently, Parsifal (2018). In the years prior, Sir Simon collaborated with the Salzburg Osterfestspiele, where he conducted staged

Rundfunks, Staatskapelle Berlin and Vienna Philharmonic, with which he has recorded the complete Beethoven symphonies and piano concertos with Alfred Brendel. Sir Simon is also a Principal Artist of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and Founding Patron of Birmingham Contemporary Music Group.

The 2019/20 season sees Sir Simon embark upon tours to Hong Kong, China and Vietnam, as well as the US and Europe with the LSO. He returns to the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks with a programme of Strauss, Schumann and Rameau, the Berlin Philharmonic for Beethoven’s Christ on the Mount of Olives and will tour Europe and the US in a chamber music project with mezzo-soprano Magdalena Kožená. This season’s operatic highlights include Der Rosenkavalier at the Metropolitan Opera, Berg’s Wozzeck at the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence and Mozart’s Idomeneo at the Deutsche Staatsoper Berlin.

Sir Simon Rattle was knighted in 1994. In the New Year’s Honours of 2014 he received the Order of Merit from Her Majesty the Queen. •

11Artist Biographies

Lisa Batiashvili violin

named Musical America’s Instrumentalist of the Year in 2015, was nominated as Gramophone’s Artist of the Year in 2017, and in 2018 was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from the Sibelius Academy (University of Arts, Helsinki).

Lisa lives in Munich and plays a Joseph Guarneri ‘del Gesù’ from 1739, generously loaned by a private collector. •

isa Batiashvili, the Georgian-born German violinist, is praised by audiences and fellow musicians for

her virtuosity. An award-winning artist, she has developed long-standing relationships with the world’s leading orchestras, conductors and musicians.

Batiashvili is also the Artistic Director of Audi Sommerkonzerte, Ingolstadt. For the 2019 festival – Fantastique – Batiashvili curated a diverse programme featuring artists such as Daniel Harding with the Bayerische Rundfunk Sinfonieorchester, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Gautier Capuçon, Les Vents Français and Kammerphilharmonie Bremen. For the 2020 festival, Batiashvili will design a programme to celebrate Audi’s anniversary year.

In the 2019/20 season, Batiashvili performs with, among others, the Philadelphia Orchestra/Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Staatskapelle Berlin/Daniel Barenboim, Orchestre de Paris/Lahav Shani, Gewandhausorchester Leipzig/Andris Nelsons, and Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich/Paavo Järvi.

Recording exclusively for Deutsche Grammophon, Lisa’s latest album, Visions of Prokofiev (Chamber Orchestra of Europe/Yannick Nézet-Séguin), won an Opus Klassik Award and was shortlisted for the 2018 Gramophone Awards. Earlier recordings include the concertos of Tchaikovsky and Sibelius (Staatskapelle Berlin/Daniel Barenboim), Brahms (Staatskapelle Dresden/Christian Thielemann), and Shostakovich Violin Concerto No 1 (Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks/Esa-Pekka Salonen).

Batiashvili has had DVD releases of live performances with the Berlin Philharmonic/Yannick Nézet-Séguin (Bartók’s Violin Concerto No 1) and with Gautier Capuçon, Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden and Christian Thielemann (Brahms’ Concerto for Violin and Cello).

She has won a number of awards: the MIDEM Classical Award, the Choc de l’année, the Accademia Musicale Chigiana International Prize, the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival’s Leonard Bernstein Award and the Beethoven-Ring. Batiashvili was

12 Artist Biographies

Elsa Dreisig soprano Pavol Breslik tenor

lsa Dreisig was awarded First Prize in the renowned vocal competition Operalia in 2016. The same year,

she was named Vocal Discovery of Victoires de la Musique Classique, and Young Artist of the Year in esteemed magazine Opernwelt. In 2017, she was awarded Young Opera Artist of the Year in Denmark’s Copenhagen Opera Festival. Before this, in 2015, she had been awarded both Second Prize of the Queen Sonja Competition in Oslo, as well as First Prize and Audience’s Prize in the New Voices Competition of the Bertelsmann Foundation in Gütersloh.

A member of the Berlin State Opera opera-studio from 2015 until 2017, she then joined the Berlin State Opera ensemble, appearing as Pamina (The Magic Flute,

Mozart), Euridice (Orfeo ed Euridice, Gluck), Diane (Hippolyte et Aricie, Rameau), Gretchen (Szenen aus Goethes Faust, Schumann for the reopening of the Staatsoper Unter den Linden), Gretel (Hansel and Gretel, Humperdinck), Musetta (La bohème, Puccini), Violetta (La traviata, Verdi), and Natascha (Violetter Schnee, world premiere by Beat Furrer). She made her debut at the Paris Opera as Pamina and returned as Lauretta (Gianni Schicchi, Puccini) and Zerlina (new production of Don Giovanni, Mozart). At the Zurich Opera, she performed Musetta before making her role debut as the title role in Massenet’s Manon in a new production in 2019. At the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, she was Micaëla in a new production of Bizet’s Carmen.

Elsa Dreisig graduated from the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse in Paris. She is under exclusive contract with Warner Music (Erato). Her first solo album, released in autumn 2018, has been awarded several prizes (Diamant, Opéra Magazine; Diapason d’or de l’année, Diapason; and Choc de l’année, Classica, among others).

In 2019, Elsa Dreisig was awarded the very prestigious Danish Crown Prince Couple’s Culture Prize. •

avol Breslik became famous as a Mozart tenor, performing as Idamante (Idomeneo) at the

reopening of the Munich Cuvilliés Theatre, Ferrando (Così fan tutte) at the Metropolitan Opera and in London, and Belmonte (Entführung) in Munich. At the age of 21, he made his professional debut as Don Ottavio (Don Giovanni) in Prague, later also appearing in the role in Salzburg and Munich. Breslik has appeared repeatedly as Tamino (The Magic Flute) in Munich – where he made his house debut with the role in 2006 – Barcelona, Baden-Baden and with the Metropolitan Opera, New York.

After being a member of the ensemble of the Berlin State Opera Unter den Linden for three seasons, he started his freelance

career in 2006, and has since been a regular guest at major European and overseas opera houses.

He appeared in the major tenor roles at Vienna State Opera; Paris Opera; Bayerische Staatsoper; Royal Opera, Covent Garden; Metropolitan Opera; Semperoper Dresden; Staatsoper Berlin; and Deutsche Oper.

He has performed in Japan, Korea and Australia as well as at the opening of the Elbphilharmonie Hamburg and at the Vienna Opera Ball 2018. Recent successes include new productions at the Staatsoper Berlin of Nicolai’s The Merry Wives of Windsor and Smetana’s The Bartered Bride at Bayerische Staatsoper and Semperoper Dresden.

His discography includes, among others, Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis; Mozart’s The Magic Flute, Idomeneo and arias; Schubert’s Schöne Müllerin and most recently his Winterreise.

In the near future, Breslik will appear in concerts with the Gewandhaus Leipzig, recitals in Munich and at Schubertiade music festival, and opera performances in Zürich, Munich, Dresden, Leipzig, Barcelona and Paris. •

19 January & 13 February 2020

13Artist Biographies

David Soar bass

avid Soar was born in Nottinghamshire and studied at the Royal Academy of Music and

subsequently at the National Opera Studio.

Highlights in his 2019/20 season include his role debut as Vodník in Dvořák’s Rusalka for English National Opera and the Grand Théâtre de la Ville de Luxembourg, Lodovico in Verdi’s Otello at the Royal Opera House, and Pizzaro in Mozart’s Fidelio for Garsington Opera. In concert, he will make his debut with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra under Sir Simon Rattle.

Recent appearances have included Colline (La bohème, Puccini) and Masetto (Don Giovanni, Mozart) at the Metropolitan Opera; Mr Flint (Billy Budd, Britten), Zuniga (Carmen, Bizet)

and Quinault (Adriana Lecouvreur, Cilea) at the Royal Opera; Escamillo (Carmen), Masetto (Don Giovanni), Mr Flint and Collatinus (The Rape of Lucretia, Britten) at Glyndebourne; Mr Flint and Raleigh (Gloriana, Britten) at Madrid’s Teatro Réal; Le Duc (Roméo et Juliette, Gounod) at the Salzburg Festival; Basilio (The Barber of Seville, Rossini) at the Grange Festival; Animal Tamer and Athlete (Lulu, Berg), Basilio (The Barber of Seville), Colline, Roy Disney (The Perfect American, Philip Glass) and Bernardino (Benvenuto Cellini, Berlioz) at English National Opera; and Leporello (Don Giovanni), Figaro (The Marriage of Figaro, Mozart), Escamillo and Sparafucile (Rigoletto, Verdi) at the Welsh National Opera. Future seasons see him return to the Metropolitan Opera, the Royal Opera, and his debut at the Opernhaus Zurich.

Concert highlights include Elgar’s The Dream of Gerontius and Frère Laurent in Roméo et Juliette (BBC Symphony Orchestra/Sir Andrew Davis and Orchestre National de Lyon/Alain Altinoglu), Handel’s Messiah (The English Concert/Harry Bicket and The Academy of Ancient Music/Richard Egarr), Mendelssohn’s Elijah (Royal Flemish Philharmonic/Philippe Herreweghe), the title role in Handel’s Saul (BBC Singers) and Weill’s The Seven Deadly Sins (Hallé Orchestra/Sir Mark Elder). •

Simon Halsey chorus director

imon Halsey occupies a singular position in classical music. He is the trusted advisor on choral

singing to the world’s greatest conductors, orchestras and choruses, and also an inspirational teacher and ambassador for choral singing to amateurs of every age, ability and background. Making singing a central part of the world-class institutions with which he is associated, he has been instrumental in changing the level of symphonic singing across Europe.

He holds positions across the UK and Europe as Choral Director of the London Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, Chorus Director of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra Chorus, Artistic Director of Orfeó Català Choirs and Artistic Adviser of the Palau de

la Música, Barcelona; Artistic Director of the Berlin Philharmonic Youth Choral Programme; Creative Director for Choral Music and Projects of WDR Rundfunkchor; Director of the BBC Proms Youth Choir, Artistic Advisor of the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival Choir; Conductor Laureate of the Rundfunkchor Berlin; and Professor and Director of Choral Activities at the University of Birmingham.He is also a highly respected teacher and academic, nurturing the next generation of choral conductors on his post-graduate course in Birmingham and through masterclasses at Princeton, Yale and elsewhere.

Halsey has worked on nearly 80 recording projects, many of which have won major awards, including a Gramophone Award, Diapason d’Or, Echo Klassik, and three Grammy Awards with the Rundfunkchor Berlin. He was made Commander of the British Empire in 2015, was awarded The Queen’s Medal for Music in 2014, and received the Officer’s Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany in 2011 in recognition of his outstanding contribution to choral music in Germany.

Born in London, Simon Halsey sang in the choirs of New College, Oxford, and of King’s College, Cambridge, and studied conducting at the Royal College of Music in London. •

14 London Symphony Chorus 19 January & 13 February 2020

London Symphony Chorushe London Symphony Chorus was formed in 1966 to complement the work of the London Symphony

Orchestra and is renowned internationally for its concerts and recordings with the Orchestra. Their partnership was strengthened in 2012 with the appointment of Simon Halsey as joint Chorus Director of the LSC and Choral Director for the LSO, and the Chorus now plays a major role in furthering the vision of LSO Sing, which also encompasses the LSO Community Choir, LSO Discovery Choirs for young people and Singing Days at LSO St Luke’s.

The LSC has worked with many leading international conductors and other major orchestras, including the Berlin Philharmonic, Vienna Philharmonic, Leipzig Gewandhaus, Los Angeles Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain and the European Union Youth Orchestra. It has also toured extensively in Europe and has visited the US, Israel, Australia and south-east Asia.

The partnership between the LSC and LSO, particularly under Richard Hickox in the 1980s and 1990s, and later with Sir Colin Davis, led to its large catalogue of recordings, which have won numerous awards, including five Grammys. Gramophone included the recordings of Berlioz’s The Damnation of Faust and Romeo and Juliet on LSO Live with Sir Colin Davis as two of the ‘Top 10’ Berlioz recordings. Recent LSO Live recordings with the Chorus include Bernstein’s Wonderful Town and Berlioz’s The Damnation of Faust, both with Sir Simon Rattle.

Highlights of the 2018/19 season included Ravel’s L’enfant et les sortilèges with Sir Simon Rattle at the 2018 BBC Proms and at the Lucerne Festival, Bernstein’s Candide with Marin Alsop, Puccini’s Messa di Gloria with Sir Antonio Pappano, performances of Mahler’s Symphony No 8 at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam with the Netherlands Philharmonic and Marc Albrecht, David Lang’s the public domain with Simon Halsey, and Walton’s Belshazzar’s Feast with Sir Simon Rattle.

The 2019/20 season includes performances of Beethoven’s Christ on the Mount of Olives on tour in Europe with Sir Simon Rattle, James MacMillan’s St John Passion with Gianandrea Noseda, and Tippett’s Child of Our Time with Alan Gilbert. The Chorus is an independent charity run by its members. It is committed to excellence, to the development of its members, to diversity and engaging in the musical life of London, to commissioning and performing new works, and to supporting the musicians of tomorrow. For more information, please visit lsc.org.uk. •

President Sir Simon Rattle om cbe

Vice President Michael Tilson Thomas

Patrons Simon Russell Beale cbe Howard Goodall cbe

Chorus Director Simon Halsey cbe

Associate Directors Matthew Hamilton Nia Llewelyn Jones

Associate Conductors Lucy Hollins David Lawrence

Chorus Accompanists Benjamin Frost Chairman Owen Hanmer

Concert Manager Robert Garbolinski

LSO Choral Projects Manager Sumita Menon

15London Symphony Chorus

Sopranos Frankie Arnull+ Elizabeth Ashling Anna Byrne-Smith Carol Capper* Laura Catala-Ubassy Elisa Franzinetti+ Joanna Gueritz Maureen Hall+ Isobel Hammond^ Hidemi Hitada^ Denise Hoilette Emily Hoffnung+ Claire Hussey Alice Jones Debbie Jones Esther Kippax Jessica Kirby^ Luca Kocsmarsky^

Naomi Kroll^ Louisa Martin Jane Morley Doris Nikolic^ Gill O’Neill Maggie Owen Janina Pescinski^ Louisa Prentice Liz Reeve Jasmine Spencer Deborah Staunton Giulia Steidl Jenna Swale Jessica Villiers Gabrielle Walton-Green Lizzie Webb* Olivia Wilkinson Rachel Wilson

London Symphony Chorus on stage

^19 January only

+13 February only

*Denotes LSC Council Member

Altos Ayesha Akkari June Brawner^ Gina Broderick* Jo Buchan* Janik Dale Maggie Donnelly Lynn Eaton Linda Evans Amanda Freshwater Christina Gibbs^ Joanna Gill Rachel Green Yoko Harada Kate Harrison Jane Hickey Elisabeth Iles Ella Jackson+* Kristi Jagodin

Jill Jones Vanessa Knapp^ Gilly Lawson* Freja Leveritt+ Belinda Liao+ Anne Loveluck Aoife McInerney Jane Muir^ Caroline Mustill Siu-Wai Ng Helen Palmer Susannah Priede Lucy Reay+ Lis Smith Erika Stasiulevuciute Linda Thomas Kathryn Wells Hannah Wisher

Tenors Jorge Aguilar Paul Allatt* Matteo Anelli Erik Azzopardi Joaquim Badia Naveeth Basheer Paul Beecham Philipp Boeing Peter Bridgwood Oliver Burrows Michael Delany Ethem Demir Colin Dunn John Farrington Matt Fernando Andrew Fuller* Patrizio Giovannotti Simon Goldman Euchar Gravina

Matthew Journee Jude Lenier Kameron Locke John Marks Alastair Mathews Matthew McCabe Davide Prezzi Chris Riley Michael Scharff Peter Sedgwick Chris Straw Richard Street* Malcolm Taylor Simon Wales James Warbis Brad Warburton^ Robert Ward* Paul Williams-Burton

Basses Simon Backhouse^* Ed Beesley Gavin Buchan Andy Chan^ Matt Clarke Giles Clayton Damian Day^ Roc Fargas Thomas Fea Ian Fletcher Robert Garbolinski* Josue Garcia Rupert Gill John Graham Owen Hanmer* Bryan Hammerslay+ J-C Higgins^ Elan Higueras Calvo

Nathan Homan* Anthony Howick Peter Kellett Alex Kidney Thomas Kohut Sam Loveless George Marshall James Nageotte William Nicholson Alan Rochford+ Jesus Sanchez^ Rod Stevens Richard Tannenbaum Daniel Thompson+ Gordon Thomson Robin Thurston Jez Wareing+ Anthony Wilder+ Vocal Coaches Norbert Meyn Anita Marrison Rebecca Outram Robert Rice Assistant Chorus Master Nia Llewelyn Jones

16 The Orchestra

London Symphony Orchestra on stage

Guest Leader Andrej Power

First Violins Carmine Lauri Clare Duckworth Ginette Decuyper Laura Dixon Julian Gil Rodriguez Gerald Gregory Maxine Kwok William Melvin Laurent Quenelle Harriet Rayfield Colin Renwick Sylvain Vasseur Rhys Watkins

Second Violins David Alberman Thomas Norris Sarah Quinn David Ballesteros Matthew Gardner Naoko Keatley Belinda McFarlane Alix Lagasse Iwona Muszynska Csilla Pogany Andrew Pollock Paul Robson

Violas Rebecca Jones Gillianne Haddow German Clavijo Stephen Doman Robert Turner Michelle Bruil Luca Casciato Cynthia Perrin Sofia Silva Sousa Heather Wallington

Cellos Rebecca Gilliver Alastair Blayden Jennifer Brown Eve-Marie Caravassilis Daniel Gardner Hilary Jones Laure Le Dantec Amanda Truelove

Double Basses Colin Paris Patrick Laurence Matthew Gibson Joe Melvin José Moreira Jani Pensola

Horns Timothy Jones Eirik Haaland Angela Barnes Alexander Edmundson Jonathan Maloney

Trumpets David Elton Gustav Melander Toby Street

Trombones Mark Templeton James Maynard

Bass Trombone Paul Milner

Tuba Ben Thomson

Timpani Nigel Thomas

Percussion Neil Percy David Jackson Sam Walton

Harp Bryn Lewis

Celeste Catherine Edwards

LSO String Experience Scheme Since 1992, the LSO String Experience Scheme has enabled young string players from the London music conservatoires at the start of their professional careers to gain work experience by playing in rehearsals and concerts with the LSO. The musicians are treated as professional ‘extra’ players (additional to LSO members) and receive fees for their work in line with LSO section players. The Scheme is supported by: The Polonsky Foundation Derek Hill Foundation Barbara Whatmore Charitable Trust Thistle Trust Idlewild Trust

Editorial Photography Ranald Mackechnie, Chris Wahlberg, Harald Hoffmann, Marco Borggreve, Oliver Helbig, Chris Singer, Simon Fowler, Lawrence Brownlee Print Cantate 020 3651 1690 Advertising Cabbells Ltd 020 3603 7937

Details in this publication were correct at time of going to press.

19 January & 13 February 2020

Flutes Gareth Davies Sharon Williams

Oboes Juliana Koch Olivier Stankiewicz Rosie Jenkins

Cor Anglais Christine Pendrill

Clarinets Chris Richards Chi-Yu Mo

Bass Clarinet Duncan Gould

Saxophone Simon Haram

Bassoons Rachel Gough Daniel Jemison Joost Bosdijk

Contra Bassoon Dominic Morgan