4th concert in the PIANO CONCERTO series
1st concert in the festival PRACTICAL SPIRITUALITY

John Adams
Piano Concerto Century Rolls

Max Richter
Infra

Richard Strauss
Sinfonia domestica, Op. 53

VÍKINGUR ÓLAFSSON piano
Estonian National Symphony Orchestra
Conductor KRISTJAN JÄRVI

According to the composer himself, Century Rolls, a piano concerto written in 1997 by the American composer John Adams, embraces the piano music of the entire previous century, while being mainly inspired by the sounds of the pianola, the self-playing piano that became popular at the beginning of the 20th century. Besides the temporal element (‘century’), the title of the composition makes reference to the perforated paper or metal rolls used for recording the music replayed by pianolas.

The works by the German-born composer Max Richter have been categorised under Neoclassicism as well as ambient or electroacoustic music. Infra is the theme that runs through the album of the same name, released by FatCat Records in 2010 and reissued four years later by Deutsche Gammophon.

The soloist, Icelandic pianist Víkingur Ólafsson, is a rare combination of passionate musicality, explosive virtuosity and intellectual curiosity. He is one of the most original younger generation pianists who has given solo concerts in many prestigious concert halls all over the world and performed with famous orchestras and conductors. In 2012, at the age of only 28, he established a chamber music festival in Reykjavík, which has now become an annual event. The festival immediately received the prize of the Music Event of the Year in Iceland as well as a special prize for innovation. Ólafsson has also been the artistic director of the Vinterfest festival in Sweden since 2016.

Instead of a traditional end of season concert, ENSO will end its concert season with an end of season festival, which demonstrates the ability of a symphony orchestra to bring together music and musicians more broadly than allowed by the usual format of concerts on Friday evenings. The initial concept for “Practical Spirituality”, a festival produced by ENSO and Kristjan Järvi, was the search for meaning and transcendence in music, and the idea of music as a means for perceiving religion, cosmic vibrations and harmony. A festival of the same name was already held in June 2017 in Leipzig, with the MDR Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra as the main partner to Kristjan Järvi, the leader of the festival.

Kristjan Järvi has been described by the French website dedicated to classical music and dance, ResMusica, as “a generous musician without blinkers and boundaries, the archetype of an artist in the 21st century”. He has gained recognition on the world stages of classical music as “one of the canniest, and most innovative, programmers of the classical scene” (Reuters). Curating and conducting his original, genre-fusing projects with individual approach and style, his concerts have been proclaimed a “life-enhancing experience.” (Herald Scotland). To realise his pioneering ideas, Kristjan Järvi has creative outlets all over the world: he is the principal conductor of the MDR Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Gstaad Festival Orchestra, the founder-conductor of his New York based classical-hip-hop-jazz group Absolute Ensemble, and the founder and conductor of the Baltic Sea Philharmonic. He works as a guest conductor with orchestras all over the world: the London Symphony Orchestra, French National Orchestra, Paris Orchestra, Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra in Washington, Minnesota Orchestra and NHK Symphony Orchestra in Japan among many others. As a recording artist, Järvi has more than 60 albums to his credit, from Hollywood soundtracks and award-winning albums by Sony Classical and Chandos, to his eponymous series – the “Kristjan Järvi Sound Project” – under the prestigious French record label Naïve Classique.

Tickets: 22 € / 16 €
BUY TICKET: PILETILEVI, PILETIMAAILM

Concert is produced by ENSO