Join us on Sunday, April 28 at 1 p.m. on WRTI 90.1 and Monday, April 29 at 7 p.m. on WRTI HD-2 as The Philadelphia Orchestra in Concert brings you Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony, a concerto for the Chinese traditional pipa by Zhao Jiping, and a rediscovered treasure by Polish composer Feliks Nowowiejski. Anna Sułkowska-Migoń, a fast-rising young Polish conductor, makes her debut with The Philadelphia Orchestra.
The concert opens with the Overture to Baltic Legend, an opera by Feliks Nowowiejski written in 1924. Though an unfamiliar name today outside Poland, Nowowiejski was well known in both Europe and the Americas. His celebrated oratorio Quo Vadis appeared in 1909 and garnered some 200 performances on both sides of the Atlantic, right up until the outbreak of the Second World War. The tumult of that event seems to have cast Nowowiejski into obscurity. He died in 1946, never again achieving his pre-war renown beyond his native Poland. The plot of Baltic Legend concerns a poor fisherman who is tasked with retrieving priceless jewels from the queen of a watery kingdom beneath the Baltic Sea. The opera’s overture is brilliant and melodic, with a dramatic evocation of the turbulent ocean.
The visionary pipa virtuoso Wu Man is featured in the Concerto No. 2 written for her a decade ago by Chinese composer Zhao Jiping. Wu Man has premiered hundreds of new works for the pipa, many of them involving Western classical orchestra. This Chinese traditional instrument is a cousin of the lute and other plucked instruments familiar to us, Wu Man says: “A lot of string plucking instruments, they all came from the same roots.” She cites the Middle Eastern oud, the banjo, the mandolin, and the guitar in a delightful and wide-ranging conversation with producer Alex Ariff, and notes that Zhao’s concerto casts her instrument as “the storyteller.”
Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5 in E Minor closes the program. By 1888 it had been a decade since Tchaikovsky had produced a symphony. Worried that some had come to view him as a “has-been” composer, he resolved that the Fifth would be his best symphony yet. As he worked, he scribbled notes in the manuscript concerning themes of fate, providence, and faith. When the symphony was complete in August 1888, he was pleased with his final product and he looked forward to the premiere the following month.
Reaction to the three initial performances was mixed – audiences were enthusiastic, but then the critics weighed in with devastating reviews. Tchaikovsky believed the critics, forgot his own satisfaction with the symphony, and concluded that he had failed. Then, a year later, no less a contemporary than Johannes Brahms heard a performance of the Fifth in faraway Hamburg, Germany, and Brahms expressed his admiration openly. Tchaikovsky could hardly ignore such a distinguished endorsement, and his confidence in the piece returned. “I have started to love it again,” he wrote to his nephew. “My earlier judgment was undeservedly harsh.”
PROGRAM:
Nowowiejski: Baltic Legend Overture
Zhao: Pipa Concerto No. 2
Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 5 in E Minor, Op. 64
The Philadelphia Orchestra
Anna Sułkowska-Migoń, conductor
Wu Man, pipa
WRTI PRODUCTION TEAM:
Melinda Whiting: Host
Alex Ariff: Senior Producer
Joseph Patti: Broadcast Engineer
Listen to The Philadelphia Orchestra in Concert broadcasts every Sunday at 1 p.m. on WRTI 90.1, streaming at WRTI.org, on the WRTI mobile app, and on your smart speaker. Listen again on Mondays at 7 p.m. on WRTI HD-2. Listen for up to two weeks after broadcast on WRTI Replay, accessible from the WRTI homepage (look for Listen to The Philadelphia Orchestra in Concert On Demand).
