Music Alive
Starts at 8:00 pm on Sunday, 20 May 2012
New Zealand Symphony Orchestra / David Zinman
“An Alpine Symphony”
A concert from the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra recorded in Wellington’s Michael Fowler Centre on Friday night.
The conductor is the legendary David Zinman who leads a supersized NZSO to monumental heights in Richard Strauss’s An Alpine Symphony, giving New Zealand audiences a rare chance to experience Richard Strauss’s colossal score in its full glory.
Strauss’s extravagant final symphony tells the story of mountaineers on a storm-hit climb in the Swiss Alps. It calls for more than 100 musicians and multiple extra instruments, including an organ, a wind machine and the rarely-played woodwind instrument, the heckelphone. An off-stage brass ensemble, additional woodwinds and beefed-up percussion will augment the Orchestra for the masterwork.
This is the first time five-times Grammy Award winner David Zinman has performed in New Zealand. With a discography of more than 100 recordings and many international honours, including the prestigious Theodore Thomas Award, he is widely considered one of the finest conductors working today.
David Zinman says the aim of live classical music is to electrify and invigorate the concert hall: “Live music-making should be a vital and gripping experience … go to a concert and turn your mind on, rather than off.”
The other work in tonight’s concert is Mozart’s Prague Symphony.
This concert was recorded live in Wellington’s Michael Fowler Centre on Friday 18 May by Radio New Zealand.
