Shostakovich’s ‘Babi Yar’ Symphony and Schoenberg’s A Survivor from Warsaw

Shostakovich’s ‘Babi Yar’ Symphony and Schoenberg’s A Survivor from Warsaw

Music is our memory. Shostakovich’s ‘Babi Yar’ Symphony and Schoenberg’s raw account of a raid in the Warsaw ghetto continue to remind us of the horrors of the Second World War. In these compelling works, the orchestra shares the stage with the male choir of Laurens Symfonisch and the unforgettable, deep voice of Alexander Roslavets. While monuments of stone erode and crumble, music is immortal and offers us a permanent connection with history, as award-winning critic and cultural historian Jeremy Eichler shows in his acclaimed book Time’s Echo.

Weinberg’s Fantasy for Cello and Orchestra

Principal cellist Gregor Horsch shines in Mieczysław Weinberg’s bittersweet Fantasy for Cello and Orchestra, a work filled with klezmer melancholy and Polish folk melodies. A real-life ‘survivor from Warsaw’, the Polish–Jewish composer fled to the Soviet Union to escape the Nazis. Here, again, he faced antisemitism - yet also found a friend for life in Dmitry Shostakovich.

As part of Reflections on Europe, the author Jeremy Eichler will be providing an introduction to this programme.