Los Angeles Philharmonic/Gustavo Dudamel

Gustavo Dudamel conducts the Los Angeles Philharmonic in a concert of bold themes and dazzling orchestral colours, including the UK premiere of the Violin Concerto Altar de cuerda by Gabriela Ortiz.

Mexican composer Gabriela Ortiz has written seven musical ‘altars’, and the latest in the series is a violin concerto composed for brilliant Spanish violinist María Dueñas. The first movement, ‘Chilango Moorish’, refers to people from Mexico City or ‘chilango’, while Mediterranean elements pay tribute to Dueñas’s Andalusian roots. An ethereal ‘Canto abierto’ (‘Open Song’) features tuned wine glasses, and the ‘Maya déco’ culminates in a virtuosic cadenza. The work is framed by John Williams’s rousing Olympic Fanfare and Dvořák’s New World Symphony with its famous Largo.

Celebrated for his energetic and heartfelt style, Dudamel has a special rapport with the LA Phil and with Ortiz’s music: ‘Dudamel expertly controlled the coiled tension of Altar de Cuerda… He clearly connects with her compositions’ (The New York Times).