Event has already taken place. Angelic song in one of history's most powerful choral works with the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra, Richard Egarr conductor, Gothenburg Symphony Choir, Elisabet Einarsdottir soprano, Per Lindström tenor and Arvid Eriksson basso.
Concert length: 2 h 30 min incl. intermission
Stage: Stora salen
380-540 SEKStudent 190-270 SEK
Young up to 29 190-270 SEK
Let there be light! No one had heard such music until Haydn wrote it; how the light breaks in, dispels the darkness and fills the void. Let yourself be carried away by angelic singing and strings that tell us everything will be fine. Richard Egarr leads the Gothenburg Symphony and Symphony Choir in one of history’s most powerful oratorios.
Haydn’s oratorio The Creation is a happy pill that must be experienced live. Orchestra, choir, three archangels – everything roars over the listener with the message: it will be all right! There is no fall, no serpent. All that will come later.
The composer Joseph Haydn had been knocked out by the church music in Westminster Abbey with choirs of thousands. He had visited Europe’s sharpest scientists who spoke of new planets and nebulae. It was the late 18th century. The world was suddenly not what was believed for thousands of years, but much more.
The plot itself tells how God creates the world. Who sets such a thing to music, and how? Josef Haydn threw himself into the challenge with unusual solutions. The world is created with a single note – a C. And “Let there be light!” is said only once – with a triumphant sound that makes the sky fall apart.
Listen
Get to know the classical piece (performed in english in Gothenburg Concert Hall).
Introduction to the concert
Take a seat in the Great Hall one hour before the concert begins and learn more about the music you will soon experience! You will get the stories behind the music, knowledge of the composers and own reflections about the classical pieces. The introduction last for about 30 minutes, it is free and free seating in the hall. Warm welcome!
Programme
Joseph Haydn (1732-1809)
The Creation
Part 1 – Chaos. Creation day 1-4
Part 2 – Creation Day 5 and 6
Part 3 – In the Garden of Eden
On 30 April 1798 in Vienna, Haydn's oratorio was first performed. It wasn't just music history that held its breath. Haydn himself, who conducted, is said to have recorded: “Sometimes my body became as cold as ice. Sometimes it was as if a feverish heat came over me and more than once I was afraid of having a heart attack.”
However, the closeness to these heartfelt and heart-shaking emotions is characteristic of its time. A critic who was present writes at least as taken: "I never thought that human lungs, sheep's intestines and calf's skin could create such miracles […] all night long I dreamed of the creation of the world." Our own Franz Berwald's cousin echoes: "The whole performance went wonderfully. Between sections of the work, tumultuous applause; during each episode, however, it was as still as the grave.”
Despite the success, it was only during the 20th century that the work received its great recognition. In the aftermath of Romantic tone poetry and the belief in music as an absolute force, Haydn's sonorous way of musically portraying the story of creation emerged in a new light. Not only do we get some of the stories of the Old Testament, but they are embodied with a music where melody, phrase and tonality are expanded and transformed to also in their own form become a mirror of the creation of light, life and finally: music that seems rise above the darkness that precedes creation in the Bible.
Esaias Järnegard
Friday, 22 March 2024: The event ends at approx. 20.30
Saturday, 23 March 2024: The event ends at approx. 17.30
Participants
The Gothenburg Symphony was formed in 1905 and today consists of 109 musicians. The orchestra's base is Göteborgs Konserthus, the funk gem at Götaplatsen that has gathered music lovers since 1935. Since the 2017-2018 season, Santtu-Matias Rouvali has been Chief conductor of the Gothenburg Symphony. Since the 2019-2020 season, Barbara Hannigan is Principal guest conductor. We are also a proud partner of Barbara Hannigan's Equilibrium mentoring program focusing on young singers at the start of their careers.
Wilhelm Stenhammar was the orchestra's chief conductor from 1907 to 1922. He gave the orchestra a strong Nordic profile and invited colleagues Carl Nielsen and Jean Sibelius to the orchestra. Under the direction of conductor Neeme Järvi from 1982-2004, the orchestra made a series of international tours as well as a hundred disc recordings and established themselves among Europe's leading orchestras. In 1996, the Swedish Riksdag appointed the Gothenburg Symphony as Sweden's National Orchestra.
In recent decades, the orchestra has had prominent chief conductors such as Mario Venzago and Gustavo Dudamel, following Kent Nagano as Principal Guest conductor. Anna-Karin Larsson is CEO and artistic director, Gustavo Dudamel honorary conductor and Neeme Järvi chief conductor emeritus. The orchestra's owner is the Västra Götaland Region.
The Gothenburg Symphony works regularly with conductors such as Herbert Blomstedt, Joana Carneiro, Jukka-Pekka Saraste, Christian Zacharias and Anja Bihlmaier.
Richard Egarr is musical director of the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra and Chorale since August 2020. Before that, he was music director of the Academy of Ancient Music for 15 years. He is also first guest conductor of the Residentie Orkest, artistic partner of St Paul Chamber and was Associate artist of Scottish Chamber 2011-2017.
Egarr's repertoire ranges from historical to modern symphonic performances. He has conducted many leading symphony orchestras, including the London Symphony, the Royal Concertgebouw and the Philadelphia Orchestra. The 2023-2024 season includes guest conducting with Gothenburg Symphony, City of Birmingham Symphony, Scottish Chamber and a CD of French repertoire with Orquesta Sinfonica Castilla y Leon. He conducts repertoire from Gabrieli to Schubert, Tippett and Ives with the St Paul Chamber, and Bach's St Matthew's Passion and Beethoven's 9th with the Residentie Orkest. With Philharmonia Baroque, Schumann's Requiem and works by Errollyn Wallen and Tarik O'Regan are planned alongside the core Baroque repertoire.
Egarr regularly gives solo harpsichord concerts at Wigmore Hall and Carnegie Hall and his extensive discography on Harmonia Mundi includes solo piano works by Bach, Handel, Mozart and Couperin. His recordings with the Academy of Ancient Music include several award-winning Handel records and J S Bach's Both Passions and his recording of Dussek's Messe Solemnelle won Gramophone Best Choral Recording 2021.
Egarr taught for many years at the Amsterdam Conservatory of Music and was a visiting professor at the Juilliard School for over 10 years.
Elisabet Einarsdottir has studied singing and opera at the Verdi Conservatory in Milan, the Malmö Opera Academy and the Academy of Music in Reykjavik.
She has sung roles such as Fiordiligi in Cosi fan tutte, Aspasia in Mitridate, re di Ponto, Titania in A Midsummer Night's Dream, Norina in Don Pasquale, Susanna in The Marriage of Figaro, Zerlina in Don Giovanni at opera houses such as Malmö Opera, the Royal Theater in Copenhagen, Kurtheater Bad Ems in Germany, Teatro Titano in San Marino, Ekhof Theater in Gotha in Germany and at the Vadstena Academy.
She also often appears as a soloist with various orchestras, ensembles and choirs. Examples of works she has sung are Carmina Burana by Carl Orff, Exultate Jubilate by Mozart, Magnificat by Bach, Stabat Mater by Pergolesi and Les Illuminations by Britten
Per Lindström graduated from the University of Music and Drama in Gothenburg in June 2018, where he studied roles such as Don José in Carmen, the title role in The Tales of Hoffmann, Tamino in The Magic Flute, Don Ottavio in Don Giovanni and Gabriel von Eisenstein in Die Fledermaus.
In the summer of 2018, Per had great success at Läckö Castle Opera as Aubry in Der Vampyr by H. Marschner. He has sung Alfredo in La Traviata at the Norrland Opera and Jonah in Humanoid at the Konzert Theater Bern. In the 2023-2024 season, we see him as Pang in Turandot at Malmö Opera. Per Lindström was awarded the Jussi Björlingssällskapet Prize in 2019.
Arvid Eriksson graduated from the Royal Academy of Music in 2021. He also has a degree in church music and has been a member of the renowned ensemble Göteborg Baroque.
He has focused on the performance of art singing and concert, which he has developed under the guidance of artists such as Anne Sofie von Otter and Peter Mattei. In 2021, he made his debut in the Berwaldhallen and performed Fauré's Requiem with the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Radio Choir. Among the highlights in 2022 were performances of Handel's Messiah with the Helsingborg Symphony Orchestra and a tour of Mahler's Rückert-Lieder in an arrangement for baritone and piano quartet.
Arvid Eriksson's concert repertoire includes works by Bach such as St John's Passion, St Matthew's Passion, Christmas Oratorio, Mass in B minor and several cantatas, Handel's Messiah, Haydn's Creation and Stabat Mater, Requiem by Brahms, Mozart, Fauré, Duruflé and others, as well as works by Beethoven, Britten, Monteverdi, Roman and Larsson. He also often performs lieder by, among others, Schubert, Strauss, Brahms, Ravel, Sibelius and Finzi. Closest to the heart, however, are the Swedish art songs, including songs by Stenhammar, Rangström and Peterson-Berger.
During the 2023-2024 season, he debuted with the Gulbenkian Orchestra, Lisbon, and Ton Koopman in Mozart's C minor Mass, in Handel's Messiah he met the Västerås Sinfonietta for the first time and Haydn's Creation marks his first appearance with the Gothenburg Symphony.
The choir was founded in 1917 by cousins Elsa and Wilhelm Stenhammar. Elsa Stenhammar was one of the driving forces in turn-of-the-century choir life in Gothenburg and became the choir's first rehearser. On December 8, 1917, the choir debuted in Beethoven's Choir Fantasy with Wilhelm Stenhammar as soloist at the grand piano. As the country's oldest symphonic choir, they were able to celebrate their 100th anniversary in 2017 with a big celebratory concert where Mozart and Brahms as well as Stenhammar, Elfrida Andrée and Björn & Benny were on the program.
The Gothenburg Symphony Choir is a non-profit association that is linked to the Gothenburg Symphony. The choir participates in concerts and performances under both the orchestra's and its own auspices. The music is mixed and the repertoire extensive. The Gothenburg Symphony Choir has participated in concerts in, among other places, the Royal Albert Hall and Canterbury Cathedral in England, as well as participated with the Gothenburg Symphony in the annual music festival in the Canary Islands and on a tour to China.
031-726 53 00
biljett@gso.se
