R. Strauss
Tod und Verklärung 26'
Burleske 22'
interval
Mozart
Rondo in A major for piano and orchestra, K386 9'
Nielsen
Symphony No. 5 36'
Francesco Piemontesi piano
BBC National Orchestra of Wales
Thomas Søndergård conductor
In the first of his two concerts with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, Thomas Søndergård directs Nielsen's Fifth Symphony, shaped by the conflicts and oppositions of the First World War and touching on a bleak nostalgia that is also at the core of Strauss's tone-poem Tod und Verklärung ('Death and Transfiguration') – a musical dramatisation of the roaming thoughts of a dying artist.
Profundity is balanced by virtuosity in the 'complicated nonsense' of Strauss's youthful Burleske and Mozart's sunny Rondo in A major, both featuring former BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artist Francesco Piemontesi.