6. Sinfoniekonzert: LANDSCHAFTEN

“Looking at a landscape can generate complex psychological states, and perhaps music is the ideal medium to describe the subtle nuances of emotion and sensitivity which hover between the unconscious and the conscious.”

Who may have made this apparently scientific statement? It could apply to all three works featured in the 6th Symphony Concert! To Jean Sibelius’ final tone poem Tapiola (named after Tapio, mythical god of the forest) which documents the effect of the forest on the composer’s psyche with its melancholy expanse, its impenetrable web of sound and exciting layering of tones. To George Crumb’s orchestra piece A Haunted Landscape from the year 1984, a ghostly night music of magical spatial impact and exciting sound effects with an electronically amplified piano and percussion elements from across the world.

And the quote could even apply to Antonín Dvořák’s Ninth Symphony with its marketable title From the New World, which appears to be more concerned with the Czech composer’s European roots than with his adopted country of North America. All three works are connected by their echoes of nature, the experience of landscape as sound. Here is the solution to the riddle: The statement was made by George Crumb, the great American composer of the 20th century, who will be 93 years old at the time of the concert. This will be the first time that his music is performed at the Opera House, conducted by Australian-Swiss conductor Elena Schwarz.