Clara-Jumi Kang and the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra

Young English conductor Finnegan Downie Dear leads the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra in music by Mussorgsky and his teacher Adès. They also accompany Clara-Jumi Kang in Britten's Violin Concerto.

Clara-Jumi Kang plays Britten's Violin Concerto
German-Korean violinist Clara-Jumi Kang plays one of the icons of the 20th century violin repertoire: Benjamin Britten's Violin Conc erto. A 1939 work written between war and love. A convinced pacifist, Britten fled the threat of war in Europe and left for America. His friend Peter Pears went with him and it was at this very time that their friendship grew into a lifelong close relationship. Two extremes in this music, driven by drama and lyricism.

Finnegan Downie Dear conducts Painting Exhibition by Mussorgsky/Ravel
The concert is conducted by young English conductor Finnegan Downie Dear. He surprised the music world when he gloriously won the Bamberger Symphoniker's International Mahler Competition in 2020, in the middle of corona time. He leads the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra in Paintings from an Exhibition of Mussorgsky, inspired by the art of his friend, the painter Viktor Hartmann. In turn, Mussorgsky's piano notes were the inspiration for Ravel, who turned them into an immortal work with his colorful orchestration. For some time Downie Dear was assistant to composer-conductor Adès. He therefore opens the concert with Adès' symphonic impression of his opera The Exterminating Angel.