Motorbike Odyssey. LNSO, Frederic Belli, Vilmantas Kaliūnas

Performers:
LITHUANIAN NATIONAL SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
(artistic director and principal conductor Modestas Pitrėnas)
Soloist FREDERIC BELLI (trombone, Germany)
Conductor VILMANTAS KALIŪNAS

Programme:
ARTHUR HONEGGER – Pacific 231, H. 53
JAN SANDSTRÖM – Concerto for trombone and orchestra No. 1 Motorbike Odyssey
GUSTAV MAHLER – Symphony No. 1 in D major

The Lithuanian National Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Vilmantas Kaliūnas, will reveal itself in a slightly unusual, madcap scope and prove that a symphony orchestra is not necessarily just a sophisticated, lyrical performer of classical music! Swiss composer Arthur Honegger’s symphonic movement Pacific 231 revolutionised the early 20th-century music scene. Honegger gave his work the name of a model steam locomotive. This work, which imitates the sounds of a steam locomotive, is an example of an urban style rare in music, capturing the rhythm of modern urban life.

Jan Sandström’s Concerto for trombone and orchestra No. 1, also known as the Motorbike Odyssey, not only continues the urban theme, but also alludes to Homer’s epic The Odyssey. Sandström’s protagonist is a modern-day Odysseus, wandering the world with his trombone.

The concert’s closing work, Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No 1 in D major, returns to a lyrical sound, but it is linked to the first two opuses by the theme of travel – Mahler has hinted that his symphony was inspired by the German writer Jean Paul’s novel Titan, which describes the philosophical journey of the novel’s main character.

German trombonist Frederic Belli is considered to be one of the world’s finest trombonists. In 2007, Belli became the first trombonist to win the Deutscher Musikwettbewerb, the most important competition for young musicians in Germany organised for three decades. In the same year, he won second prize and the Brüder Busch Special Prize at the ARD, Germany’s largest international classical music competition. Belli is a “Deutsche Stiftung Musikleben” scholarship holder, a member and a soloist with the Southwest German Radio Symphony Orchestra in Baden-Baden and Freiburg.