'When you stand before me and look at me, what do you know of the pain within me? And what do I know of that within you?' When Detlev Glanert was commissioned to write a symphony for Prague, he turned to Franz Kafka – whose words, he says 'spoke to me immediately'. The result is a song-symphony in the tradition of Mahler that speaks directly to our time: exactly what you’d expect from this most communicative of living composers.
For this UK premiere performance, it’s conducted by its dedicatee, the great Semyon Bychkov, who caused a sensation with the world premiere in Prague last December. He’s paired it with another deeply personal Fourth Symphony by a composer who thrived on reinventing tradition – Johannes Brahms. Expect beauty, truth, and deep emotions honestly shared: in other words, a night to remember.
Produced by BBC Symphony Orchestra