RIENZI OVERTURE – RICHARD WAGNER

THE NUTCRACKER (EXCERPTS) – PYOTR TCHAIKOVSKY

SYMPHONY NO 2 – JOHANNES BRAHMS

THE RIENZI OVERTURE  – RICHARD WAGNER

The Rienzi Overture (WWV 49) by Richard Wagner (1813-1883), was his third opera, it was an immediate hit when premiered in Dresden in 1842. The full work lasted 6 hours, incorporated a 40-minute ballet sequence and proved to be his longest ever! Set in the final years of the Roman Empire, the title character, a tribune, rails against the corrupt excesses of the city’s senate, but is ultimately unsuccessful. We will play the prologue which is very much shorter, yet full of fanfares and memorable tunes; it proved immensely popular at the inaugural Henry Wood Promenade Concert in London in 1895 and we hope you’ll understand why!

THE NUTCRACKER SUITE – PYOTR ILYICH TCHAIKOVSKY

In much lighter vein, the Nutcracker Suite (Op 71a) by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893) was another immediate success when first heard in St Petersburg in 1892. Strangely though, the full ballet performance had not been so well-received; perhaps the story (on which it’s based) by German author Ernst Hoffmann, which sees little Clara befriend the Nutcracker given her on Christmas Eve and take up the struggle against the evil Mouse King, was just too fantastic! Whatever the reason, the familiar tunes we look forward to playing have long since become enchanting, seasonal favourites!

SYMPHONY NO 2 – JOHANNES BRAHMS

Our last piece, the Symphony No 2 in D Major (Op 73) by Johannes Brahms (1833-1897), is accepted as the most cheerful of his four brilliant symphonies and often described as his ‘Pastoral’. Written in the bucolic surroundings of the Austrian Lakes in 1877, it took him just 5 months to compose, unlike his first which had taken a marathon 14 years to complete. By this time a confident composer completely in his stride, this masterpiece further develops the symphonic legacy of Beethoven; the finale in particular is seen as his most athletic and ebulliently festive movement ever, and it ends in a brilliant blaze of brass.