Seong-Jin Cho plays Shostakovich

Seong-Jin Cho, winner of the 2015 Chopin Piano Competition, adds his ‘breathtaking nimbleness’ to the Philharmonia Orchestra in Shostakovich’s playful concerto.

Cho has gone from strength to strength since winning the International Chopin Piano Competition in 2015. Performing with the Philharmonia at last year’s Edinburgh International Festival, he won praise from The Scotsman for his ‘breathtaking nimbleness’.

And nimbleness is exactly what’s needed for Shostakovich’s Concerto for Piano, Trumpet and Strings, which fizzes with energy and humour.

Santtu-Matias Rouvali, the Philharmonia Orchestra’s Principal Conductor, opens with Sibelius’ Sixth Symphony. Sibelius himself described it as ‘pure cold water’, in contrast to the ‘cocktails of every hue’ served up by more avant-garde composers in the 1920s. But there’s plenty of warmth and cheerfulness in this symphony too.

Shostakovich said he wanted his Sixth Symphony to convey ‘the moods of spring, joy, youth’. Perhaps he was thinking of the mood swings of adolescence – an introspective first movement gives way to a colourful and carefree scherzo, then a frenzied finale.

Supported by the Korean Cultural Centre UK. Celebrating 140 years of friendship between the UK and the Republic of Korea.

Performers

Philharmonia Orchestra
Santtu-Matias Rouvali conductor
Seong-Jin Cho piano
Jason Evans trumpet

Repertoire

Sibelius: Symphony No.6 in D minor
Shostakovich: Concerto for piano, trumpet & strings (Piano Concerto No.1)
– Interval –
Shostakovich: Symphony No.6 in B minor