Rebellion against defeat has often generated the most impressive music. Ranging from great emotions to undercover resistance, works from the eventful 20th century that have transformed stories into sound will captivate the audience in this concert. A love story is told by the Soviet-Armenian composer Aram Khachaturian in his adagio from the ballet Spartacus. Gloriously passionate and melodious, the full orchestral sound illustrates grand emotions between gladiator Spartacus and his wife Phrygia which had no future, because the slave rebellion led by the rebel was to be defeated and Spartacus to be executed.

Musical rebellion can also be discerned in the grotesquely beautiful sounds of Dmitri Shostakovich’s Symphony No.5. The composer created it as a response to the harsh criticism of his music, which was deemed not to be sufficiently in keeping with Soviet ideals and hence threatened to lead to an occupational ban or even arrest. The plan worked: The powers that be were satisfied, while the audience recognised Shostakovich’s sarcasm and only apparent obedience, and celebrated the composer for it.

The responses to the Trumpet Concert in A flat major by Khachaturian’s compatriot Arutiunian have also been jubilant ever since its creation in 1950. The work brought him international fame – firstly because of the first and legendary performance by its dedicatee Timofei Dokschitzer and secondly because of its winning catchiness. “I love bathing in this tapestry of sound”, says the Norwegian soloist Tine Thing Helseth about the emotional and multi-faceted concerto. This will be her first co-operation with the State Orchestra of Lower Saxony Hanover. Conductor Anna Rakitina, born in Moscow and trained in Hamburg, will also give her Hanover-debut.