About the Programme
Travel experiences – could we say summarizing the program of the concert – but the expression can only be applied on Elgar’s Cello concerto in a leveraged sense: Sir Edward William Elgar – the great English pathfinder of the turn of the century (XIX-XX.) – created a peculiar style, leaning on the late romantic period and he decisively influenced the advancement of English music. Wagner’s overture – just like the opera – which sounds up before the play, was born out of a real travel experience: in the summer of 1839, he arrived back to London from Riga on a difficult sea voyage. He heard the legend of the flying Dutchman from the sailors, which came alive in his mind on the stormy journey. Felix Mendelssohn made a study trip to Italy at the age of twenty two. Two years later, he perpetuated his impressions in his IV., A-major symphony. A harmonic feeling is radiating from the joy of the first movement, a lyric from the second, a slightly German homesickness from the scherzo and the wild South Italian Saltarello from the last.