Dmitri Shostakovich (1906–1975) wrote his Violin Concerto No. 1 in A minor during 1947/48, in the midst of the Zhdanov “anti-formalist” terror campaign sweeping Soviet cultural life. The work could not be premiered until after Stalin’s death, when David Oistrakh gave the first performance in 1955. Unusually for a concerto, the work is in four movements, each (equally unusually) bearing a title in keeping with its genre: Nocturne, Scherzo, Passacaglia, and Burlesque. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840–1893) completed his Symphony No. 6 in B minor, Op. 74 (“Pathétique”) just a few months before his death. This four-movement opus, with its pained, intensely emotional and at times almost lethargic tone, surprises the listener with several formal innovations: the second movement is a graceful waltz-like dance in the rare 5/4 metre, the third movement is a vigorous, march-like Allegro molto vivace that builds to a triumphant, seemingly finale-like climax, only for the true finale to maintain a slow tempo. The Chinese-Indonesian Canadian violinist Timothy Chooi won First Prize at the 2018 International Joseph Joachim Violin Competition, while the Russian Alevtina Ioffe is chief conductor of the Bern Opera and is one of what is a thankfully growing number of female conductors on the international scene.

Presented by: Hungarian National Philharmonic