Weber Beethoven Verunelli Ravel by Beethoven, Verunelli, Von Weber, Ravel, -tól (2016/2016), Karmester Susanna Mälkki, Konserthus, Oslo, Norway

With his fourth piano concerto, Beethoven bid farewell with an important part of his musical identity: the dazzling piano virtuoso. Before Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) had his breakthrough as a composer, he was known as one of the most impressive keyboard virtuosos of his age. His first successes came with improvisations at private salons, and later as a composer and soloist on the city’s stages. The first piano concertos from the 1790s were important tools in establishing himself as an pianist on the highest level. The fourth of his five piano concertos was produced in the years 1805 and 1806, but it was first in December 1808 that it was played in public for the first time, under a marathon concert with several Beethoven premieres. This was to be Beethoven’s last performance as a soloist in one of his own works for piano. His deteriorating hearing made performing impossible, as he found a couple of years later when he attempted to play his fifth concerto. After the fifth, Beethoven didn’t write any more piano concertos. And it was not just his inspiration that disappeared when he left the podium: he also lost an important source of income. Still, as a composer he could relish the excellent reviews: one critic wrote after the world premiere of the fourth concerto that it was the most admirable of all Beethoven’s concertos. Nevertheless, the concerto was somewhat forgotten after its first performance, and almost 30 years passed before anyone heard it again. Felix Mendelssohn brought it back in 1836, and later generations of listeners have placed Beethoven’s fourth concerto amongst the best piano concertos of all time. After having commenced his first three piano concertos with long introductions by the orchestra, he turns the model upside down in the fourth concerto, letting the soloist begin alone. Also throughout the rest of the first movement it is as if the composer is saving some the orchestra’s energy. The soloist’s part swells with rich, brilliant lines which demand virtuosity of both composer and soloist. The second movement has been compared to a discussion or an argument; the voice of the piano is mild and soft while the orchestra’s tone is hard and rigid, the latter getting milder in the course of the movement. After the rondo of the third movement has been given a rather tentative start, the orchestra is finally given the opportunity to show its strength, intensifying regularly throughout the rest of the work. The French pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard has - like Beethoven - performed the world premieres of several significant works for piano; albeit not this own, but by pioneers such as Ligeti, Stockhausen and Boulez. At the same time he has specialised in Beethoven’s piano concertos, and has recorded all five with Nikolaus Harnoncourt and the Chamber Orchestra of Europe. Susanna Mälkki conducts international orchestras on the highest level, and takes over as chief conductor of the Helsinki Philharmonic in the autumn of 2016. In Europe she has paved the way for top female conductors in a traditionally male-dominated profession. Her programme spans from German Romanticism to Ravel’s Daphnis & Chloe, via a colourful work by the Italian Francesca Verunelli