To mark the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, which declared the establishment of the United States, the Kodály Philharmonic Orchestra will join the commemorations with a programme featuring works connected to America.

Programme

• Divertimento by Leonard Bernstein

• Clarinet Concerto by Aaron Copland

• Symphony No. 9 in E minor (“From the New World”), Op. 95 by Antonín Dvořák

Featuring: László Laskai – clarinet / Kodály Philharmonic Orchestra
Conductor: Imre Kollár

A versatile genius of 20th-century music, Leonard Bernstein composed his Divertimento in 1980 for the centenary of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. The composition is both a festive tribute and a personal statement: combining Bernstein’s respect for the classical musical tradition with the diversity of American musical culture and the rhythmic and stylistic influences of jazz, musical theatre and popular music. Consisting of eight short movements, the work refers in its title to the 18th-century genre of the divertimento, although Bernstein naturally speaks in the musical language of his own time.

Aaron Copland’s Clarinet Concerto was written in 1948 at the request of Benny Goodman, the legendary jazz clarinettist. The work occupies a special place in Copland’s oeuvre, as here the composer combines the tradition of the classical concerto with the sound world of jazz and American popular music. The result is a concerto that is at once elegant, lyrical, virtuosic and distinctly American. The accompanying orchestra is economical in its instrumentation: alongside the strings, it features harp and piano, thereby ensuring the solo instrument remains the focus.

Dvořák’s masterpiece, his Symphony No. 9, From the New World, is an important milestone in the integration of American musical material with the principles of classical composition. The symphony was written while Dvořák was living and working in New York as director of the National Conservatory of Music. The work was premiered at Carnegie Hall on 16 December 1893, with the New York Philharmonic.

Source: debreceniprogramok.com | Photo credit: Papp László (Facebook)