Media information, 18 March 2024.

This very weekend, the Latvian National Symphony Orchestra (LNSO) will travel to France to give a concert together with Danish violinist Anna Agafia Egholm and French maestro Jean-Claude Casadesus at the Grand Theatre de Provence in Aix-en-Provence, performing Felix Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto and Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov’s symphonic suite “Scheherazade.” LNSO’s performance will be part of the prestigious Festival de Paques (Easter Festival), taking place this year from 22 March to 7 April. Latvian audiences are invited to hear the concert programme already this Thursday, 21 March, at 19:00 at the Great Guild.

The concert “LNSO, Casadesus and Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto”* will introduce Latvian audiences to the young Danish violinist Anna Agafia Egholm, already recognised as an important messenger and influence in Europe’s musical life. Alongside her active musical and public engagements, Mendelssohn was himself prolifically active across the widest range of genres as a composer. His Violin Concerto in E minor (1838-1844) is perhaps the most famous example of the genre in history, ever since its premiere in 1845, when critics unanimously agreed that the violin repertoire had been enriched with a very special work. Violinist Joseph Joachim once said: “German music has four violin concertos. The most outstanding, the most demanding, is Beethoven’s. Brahms’ Violin Concerto can seriously rival it in seriousness. The richest, most enchanting was created by Max Bruch. But the most heartfelt, the true gem of the heart, belongs to Mendelssohn.”

The concert’s second half will feature Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov’s vividly pictorial suite “Scheherazade” (1888), inspired by fragments from the Middle Eastern collection of tales “One Thousand and One Nights.” Incidentally, Rimsky-Korsakov trained as a sailor and spent several years on sea voyages. The suite combines both a world of fairy tales and dreams, and the real, surging seascapes that the composer loved so much. This music resounds with splendid harmonies, masterful orchestration and oriental melodies that carry the listener’s imagination to far-off lands, to experience the most unimaginable adventures.

*This concert is included in the LNSO Spring Subscription 2024.

Tickets can be purchased at Bilesu Paradize box offices.