Brahms Festival 19.01.25

In this weekend, the Belgian National Orchestra, conducted by chief conductor Antony Hermus and in collaboration with Bozar, turns its attention to Brahms. Both piano concertos will be performed with French piano sensation Alexandre Kantorow as soloist, and there will also be two Belgian premieres of works that draw inspiration from Brahms' music.

The Sunday's concert at Bozar opens with the Belgian premiere of Brahms, a piece for baritone and orchestra by Thomas Adès. The text, written by the Austrian pianist and poet Alfred Brendel, portrays Brahms's malevolent spirit haunting a house and playing the piano in the middle of the night.

Then, we move on to Brahms's Second Symphony, which he composed in just a few months during the summer of 1877. Unlike his previous symphony in C minor, which was described as tragic, the Second Symphony in D major is a particularly luminous and joyful work immersed in a pastoral atmosphere. After the intermission, Alexandre Kantorow takes on the First Piano Concerto. Brahms is said to have been inspired by Robert Schumann's attempted suicide for the opening measures of this tumultuous work.