The Peterborough Symphony Orchestra (PSO) will light the spark for its 2024-25 season with “Romantic Flames” on November 2, when guest artist David Jalbert will take on one of the most technically challenging piano concertos in the classical piano repertoire.
During the season-opening concert, the orchestra will perform a classically inspired contemporary work by Indigenous composer Andrew Balfour and two iconic pieces of romantic music by Czech composer Antonín Dvorák and Russian composer Sergei Rachmaninov.
“I have been told by several of the musicians how much they are looking forward to this program and this season,” PSO music director and conductor Michael Newnham tells kawarthaNOW. “Although I am always excited to start a new year with the PSO, this year seems extra-special. The organization is going in all the right directions, in large part thanks to the outstanding work of our new general manager, Christie Goodwin, backed by our very dedicated board, staff, and volunteers.”
The concert will open with a performance of Pyotr’s Dream by Andrew Balfour, a Juno-nominated Cree composer and conductor from Winnipeg, Manitoba. A victim of the Sixties Scoop who was separated from his family as an infant, Bafour was adopted by a white settler family that encouraged his interest in music, which he developed through choral singing and playing trumpet and trombone.
Despite going through some difficult and turbulent years in his early adult life, including a dependence on alcohol and some time in prison, Bafour’s passion for music prevailed and he founded vocal ensemble Dead of Winter (formerly Camerata Nova) in 1996.
Balfour was commissioned to write Pyotr’s Dream in 2019 by Toronto’s baroque orchestra Tafelmusik. He says the commission was exciting for him because of his early background as a choral singer and “my great love for Russian classical romanticism” — in particular works by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky.
“This is a short, atmospheric work for string orchestra based on a choral piece of Tchaikovsky’s, called Hymn to the Cherubim,” Newnham explains. “And so, in a way, the benevolent godfather of this program is Tchaikovsky, who was a close friend of Dvorak and who was the beloved mentor of Rachmaninov.”
The next piece of the evening’s program will be Dvorák’s Symphony no. 8. After composing the piece in 1889 on the occasion of his election to the Bohemian Academy of Science, Literature and Arts. Dvorák conducted the premiere in Prague in 1890.
Newnham calls the four-movement symphony one of Dvorak’s “most thoroughly Czech pieces,” steeped in Czech folk rhythms and yearning melodies.
“It is full of melody, rhythm and heart,” he says. “It was actually Dvorak’s own favourite symphony, even more than the New World (Symphony no. 9). For me, it’s one of those fortuitous pieces that you can’t help but love and that you can never tire of hearing. Although there are stormy sections in this music, the general feeling is of a big, warm, sunny smile. Musicians tend to love playing this piece.”
For the evening’s finale, the PSO will invite guest artist David Jalbert to the Showplace stage to perform Piano Concerto no. 3 by Sergei Rachmaninov.
Named by the CBC as one the 15 best Canadian pianists of all time, Jalbert is a virtuoso with a wide-ranging repertoire who performs regularly as a soloist and recitalist in Canada and around the world. A national and international prize winner, he has won six Opus Awards, has received four Juno nominations for classical album of the year, and was the 2007 laureate of the prestigious Virginia Parker Prize of the Canada Council for the Arts.
“David Jalbert will be making his third visit to the PSO,” Newnham says. “Over the years, we have built a very special rapport. He is a musician’s musician and a joy to work with, as well as to hear.”
VIDEO: Rachmaninov’s “Piano Concerto no. 3” from the movie “Shine”
Rachmaninov (whose surname is also commonly spelled as Rachmaninoff) composed his piano concerto — also known as the Third Piano Concert or, more famously, as “Rach 3” — in 1909 and it premiered the same year in New York City with the composer as soloist, accompanied by the New York Symphony Society under Walter Damrosch.
“Sergei Rachmaninov was one of the greatest pianists and composers that Russia produced,” Newnham says. “Most of his music was written in the early part of the 20th century, before the Russian Revolution.”
“Although he subsequently moved to the United States, his music remained very rooted in his homeland, full of nostalgia and beautiful melodies, but also retaining great virtuosity, particularly in his piano writing.”
Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto no. 3 has the reputation of being one of the most technically challenging piano concertos in the standard classical piano repertoire. The soloist must play virtually non-stop for the entire length of the piece. In fact, the piece was so challenging that it was many years before any other pianist dared to perform it.
“The Third Piano Concerto is one of his most famous pieces and, in my opinion, one of his best,” Newnham says. “It has huge technical challenges for the pianist as well as for the orchestra.”
The work came to the broader public’s attention when it was featured in the Oscar-winning 1996 Australian film Shine, based on the true story of David Helfgott, a pianist who suffered a mental breakdown and spent years in institutions. The film depicts Helfgott’s life, beginning as a piano prodigy who was pushed to perfection by his domineering father and driven to a breakdown by the technical and emotional demands of the Rach 3.
“Romantic Flames” begins at 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, November 2nd at Showplace Performance Centre at 290 George Street North in downtown Peterborough. A pre-concert “Meet the Maestro” talk takes place at 6:45 p.m., where Newnham takes the Showplace stage for an intimate chat about the evening’s program.
Single tickets are $33, $48, or $55, depending on the seat you choose, with student tickets costing $12 for all seats. Tickets are available in person at the Showplace Box Office from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday to Thursday, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Friday, and one hour before the concert, or online anytime at showplace.org. Season subscriptions are also still available.
For more information about the Peterborough Symphony Orchestra’s 2024-25 season and for season subscriptions, visit thepso.org.
kawarthaNOW is proud to be a media sponsor of the Peterborough Symphony Orchestra’s 2024-25 season.
