Bruckner's romantic symphony

To experience Anton Bruckner’s Symphony No 4 in the concert hall is like being enfolded within a huge and wondrous structure. This work, written when the composer reached his first peak of creative strength, can appear like a musical monolith sculpted from a single block of matter. From its famously glowing opening - a soft horn evoking the mysteries of nature - the symphony becomes both deeply intimate and powerfully climactic.

In his final season as chief conductor in Stavanger, Andris Poga comes to Bergen to lead the orchestra in a performance of the first symphony by Bruckner that truly revealed the composer’s soul to the world. Before it, Poga’s Latvian compatriots and the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra’s own viola players Ilze and Liene Klava are the soloists in the Norwegian premiere of Sofia Gubaidulina’s Two Paths. The piece braids two solo violas in a passionate, coiled dialogue, gently illuminated by the orchestra, as they depict the sisters Mary and Martha who offered hospitality to Christ.