Beyond Romance: Tan Lihua & Szs by Verdi, Dvořák, Vasilyevich Rachmaninoff, From (2024/2024), Conductor Lihua Tan, Jinji Lake Concert Hall, Suzhou, China

A great evening of romantic nostalgia led by our guest conductor TAN Lihua and the young cello talent LUO Weixi. Dvořák’s Cello Concerto in B Minor is one of the most performed cello concertos in the world. Like the New World Symphony, it is another work hailing from the composer’s American period and is therefore infused with the same sense of homesick longing that pervades the symphony. Yet homesickness tells only half the tale. The Cello Concerto also contains a secret of Dvořák—an erstwhile love story, passionate and bittersweet. One may think of Rachmaninov’s Third Symphony as a piece of out - and - out nostalgia, an over - ripe romantic relic that belonged to another era even at the time of its first performance in 1936. But, there is a lot more to the way this masterpiece works than its quintessential Russian expressivity in melodic outline and rhythm. But before diving deep into this feast of late Romanticism, first enjoy the storming overture to I VESPRI SICILIANI by Verdi, the last of his full - dress overtures in which a musical and dramatical idea of death is elaborated with the orchestral technique of compelling eloquence.