Beethoven's Seventh

Grieghallen

Great friend of the orchestra Jan Willem de Vriend returns, and brings with him the composer with whom he has been electrifying audiences at the Grieg Hall over the last few years: Ludwig van Beethoven.

Many find Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7 the most compelling of the composer’s nine - a work famous for its stirring funeral march but whose insistent rhythmic drive and gameplay led Richard Wagner to describe it as ‘the apotheosis of the dance.’

Joining Jan Willem and the orchestra is a soloist who has a good claim to be the finest violinist on the planet. Frank Peter Zimmermann brings to life the poetry and perfume of Robert Schumann’s enigmatic Violin Concerto, a work long thought lost and only rediscovered after a séance.

To preface this most subtle and elegant of concertos we hear music utterly different. Jean-Féry Rebel’s suite Les Élémens depicted the formation of the natural world. As expected, the movement titled ‘Chaos’ is as brash, colourful and rabble-rousing - and yes, chaotic - as Baroque music gets.