Susanna Mälkki reunites with the London Symphony Orchestra and pianist and Spotlight Artist Kirill Gerstein for two concerts at the Barbican Centre. On November 30, Mälkki, Gerstein, and the LSO pay homage to the great composer-pianist Rachmaninoff marking the 150th anniversary of his birth with his iconic Piano Concerto No. 3. They also make both new and enduring repertoire feel like a revelation with George Benjamin’s Concerto for Orchestra and Paul Hindemith’s Symphony: Mathis der Maler.
On December 3, they take on Ravel’s virtuosic Piano Concerto for the Left Hand. Written for Paul Wittgenstein, who had lost his right arm during the horrors of World War I, it is a piece that was written in some ways as a response to war. The program also features Debussy’s Three Nocturnes and Scriabin’s yearning symphonic poem, Symphony No 4, The Poem of Ecstasy.
Photo: Marica Rosengard