Boston Philharmonic: Britten / Bartok / Shostakovich Tickets

Britten: "Passacaglia" from Peter Grimes Bartok: Piano Concerto No. 3, Benjamin Hochman, Piano Shostakovich: Symphony No. 10 The “Passacaglia” from Benjamin Britten’s Peter Grimes, with its ominous and foreboding opening viola solo, is the highlight of the opera where the narrow-minded and blinkered townspeople close in on their prey. Similarly, Shostakovich’s 10th Symphony composed just after the death of Stalin, depicts the confrontation between the dictator himself (portrayed in the harrowing 2nd movement) and the terrified composer (identified by the initials of his name spelled out in musical notation). Britten and Shostakovich deeply admired each other’s work and related to each other around the notion of persecution - personal, political, and artistic. Pianist Benjamin Hochman performs Bartok's Piano Concerto No. 3, which Bartok composed as a love letter to his wife while lying in a New York hospital awaiting death from cancer. Because of his illness, the final 17 bars had to be composed by a friend. This is a concert about the capacity of human beings to overcome enormous odds. There is much tragedy in this music, but finally, it is a concert in which the three composers, each in their distinctive way, offer us, through their profound art, a pathway to courage. Pre-concert talk at 6:45pm available to ticket holders.