Prom 8: Britten, Lutosławski & Thomas Adès

17 Jul 2013, Royal Albert Hall

19:30 Wed 17 Jul 2013 Next Event

19:30 Wed 17 Jul 2013 Royal Albert Hall

Thomas Adès conducts the BBC Symphony Orchestra, Christianne Stotijn and Simon Keenlyside in the world premiere of his Totentanz, a work inspired by a mural destroyed in the Second World War bombing of Lübeck. Britten’s Sinfonia da Requiem and Lutosławski’s Cello Concerto complete a programme of remembrance and survival.

Programme

- - Benjamin Britten
  - Sinfonia da Requiem(20 mins)
- - Witold Lutosławski
  - Cello Concerto(24 mins)
- - interval
- - Thomas Adès
  - Totentanz(45 mins)world premiere

Performers

Paul Watkins
cello
cello
Christianne Stotijn
mezzo-soprano
mezzo-soprano
Simon Keenlyside
baritone
baritone
BBC Symphony Orchestra
Thomas Adès
conductor
conductor

Composers

About this event

Britten’s Sinfonia da Requiem opens a programme of testimony and remembrance. Paul Watkins is the soloist in Lutosławski’s bleak and beautiful Cello Concerto, composed for and dedicated to Mstislav Rostropovich in a period of violent protest and political repression in Poland.

Thomas Adès conducts the BBC Symphony Orchestra and soloists Christianne Stotijn and Simon Keenlyside in the world premiere of his Totentanz, a commission in memory of Lutosławski, which sets an anonymous 15th-century text that accompanied a frieze destroyed when Lübeck’s Marienkirche was bombed in the Second World War.

Watch and listen to more music from Britten from the Proms.

Watch and listen to more Polish music from the Proms.