Shanghai Symphony Orchestra / Long Yu GUSTAV MAHLER - XIAOGANG YE The Song of the Earth

 

THE SONG OF THE EARTH

 

Maxim Vengerov / Shanghai Symphony Orchestra / Long Yu GATEWAYS

Deutsche Grammophon released Gateways today, the first of a series of albums featuring works by major Chinese composers. The album, featuring Maestro Long Yu and the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, includes two works by Qigang Chen, as well as Rachmaninov’s “Symphonic Dances” and Kreisler’s “Tambourin chinois”, with Maxim Vengerov as the soloist. 

Looking ahead, Shanghai Symphony Orchestra's 140th Anniversary Summer Worldwide Tour led by Maestro Long Yu debuts at the BBC Proms, Edinburgh International Festival, Wolf Trap and Ravinia Festival and returns to Lucerne Festival, Grafenegg, and Het Concertgebouw Amsterdam from August 14 to September 1 with soloists Eric Lu, Alisa Weilerstein, and Frank Peter Zimmermann.​

Vengerov’s sparkle is pleasing, especially after that career-threatening arm injury over a decade ago. But the biggest sonic impact here comes from Long Yu’s excellent Shanghai band, bathed in resplendent recorded sound...the musicians’ suavity is also showcased in a glossy trip through Rachmaninov’s Symphonic Dances. (The Times)

Wiener Singakademie / Shanghai Symphony Orchestra / Long Yu ORFF Carmina Burana

Deutsche Grammophon, the world’s oldest classical label, celebrated its 120^th anniversary with a concert of great cultural and historical significance at Beijing’s Forbidden City on October 10. This is the first classical concert to be hosted there since 1998 and the most important one since the Three Tenors stood on stage together in 1994.

In front of an audience of 1,200 specially-invited Chinese and international guests, Long Yu, the first Chinese conductor to perform at the Forbidden City, led the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra in their interpretation of Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana, in partnership with the mixed adult voices of the Wiener Singakademie and the Shanghai Spring Children’s Choir.

DG’s anniversary concert was the first to be held at the Imperial Ancestral Temple (Taimiao) since Zubin Mehta led a production of Puccini’s Turandot there twenty years ago, an event whose worldwide significance contributed to the 2008 Olympics being awarded to Beijing.

Lang Lang / Sophie Shao HOWARD SHORE Ruin & Memory - Mythic Gardens

World-renowned for his many award-winning film scores including “The Lord of the Rings” and “The Hobbit”, Howard Shore’s latest album “Two Concerti” shows that his immense compositional talents light up not only the cinema screen but the classical concert stage as well. Released on February 17, the album presents two specially commissioned works dedicated to the music of Frédéric Chopin – the piano concerto Ruin & Memory – performed by renowned pianist Lang Lang; and the cello concerto Mythic Gardens performed by award-winning cellist Sophie Shao.

Ruin & Memory – Concerto for Piano and Orchestra was written in celebration of Chopin’s 200th anniversary and recorded live at its world premiere at the 2010 Beijing Music Festival – whose Arts Foundation commissioned the work. Composed specifically for Lang Lang, Ruin & Memory is Shore’s musical reflection of Chopin’s time and the life he led. About the work Shore explains “The title captures a bit of Chopin’s life, about where he came from and the world he lived in, and what happened when that world was no longer there. The piece is really a love affair with the piano, the intimacy, the tactile perception of that instrument.”

For the companion piece Mythic Gardens – Concerto for Violoncello and Orchestra was commissioned for Sophie Shao by the American Symphony Orchestra. Shore took his inspiration from the architecture of three classic Italian gardens: Cimbrone, Medici and Visconti Borromeo Litta. The composer elucidates on his various muses “Growing up in Canada, I spent many summers in Northern Ontario. The surrounding natural beauty of the area was and remains a great inspiration. I believe that it is through this love of nature that I was able to connect so well to Tolkien’s work. The natural world influences the form of my compositions when writing for the concert stage as well. However, it is the incredible musicians themselves, such as Sophie Shao and Lang Lang, whose artistry is always at the center of my creativity when composing.”