BRUCKNER Symphony No. 5 in B flat major

Jiri Belohlavek conductor

The BBC Symphony Orchestra and its chief conductor, Jiri Belohlavek have garnered rave reviews for their Bruckner performances, drawing critical superlatives last year after a searing account of the Austrian composer's Seventh Symphony. 'My life has lost all joy and enthusiasm,' wrote Bruckner around the time he was working on the transcendent slow movement of his monumental Fifth Symphony in 1875. His testing personal and emotional circumstances, however, take second place to the expression of defiant optimism and ultimate triumph.

Pre-concert talk, 6.00pm
Fountain Room
An introduction to tonight's concert

SVATOPLUK HAVELKA Hommage a Hieronymous Bosch
(UK premiere)
HINDEMITH Symphonic Metamorphosis after Themes by Carl Maria von Weber
ORFF Carmina burana

Jakub Hrusa conductor
Sally Matthews soprano
John Graham-Hall tenor
William Dazeley baritone
Trinity Boys' Choir
BBC Symphony Chorus

Svatopluk Havelka, a central composer of the Czech New Wave film school, now in his early 80s, attracted worldwide acclaim following the premiere of his Homage to Hieronymous Bosch in 1974. The work's striking evocations of Bosch's paintings of late-medieval life, debauchery and death provide the ideal preface to Carl Orff's Carmina burana. Ale-swilling monks, pompous abbots, flagrant lovers and assorted gluttons here take their turn on Fortune's wheel, with Orff imparting unstoppable momentum to a score bristling with energy.

Pre-concert talk, 6.00pm
Fountain Room
An introduction to tonight’s concert

Post-concert talk
Fountain Room
Meet the BBC Symphony Chorus