Sergei Rachmaninov’s (1873–1943) Scherzo in D minor dates from 1888 as the work by a 15-year-old adolescent. The masterfully composed piece clearly reflects the influence of the Scherzo from Mendelssohn’s incidental music for A Midsummer Night’s Dream – the prototype to the Mendelssohnian “fairy scherzo” – even down to the prominent “fluttering” flute melody. The second piece jumps to the last chapter of his career: the Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini was composed in 1934, during the last decade of the composer’s life, within the walls of Villa Senar in Switzerland. Although its title includes the word “rhapsody”, it is in fact a reworking of Caprice No. 24 in A minor, the last of a large-scale cycle of virtuoso violin caprices in 24 brilliant variations by the “devil’s violinist” and composer Niccolò Paganini (1782–1840). The closing work of the programme, the Symphony No. 2 in E minor which fills the second half, was written between the first two and dates from 1907. This is one of Rachmaninov’s most expansive and popular creations, with its four movements bound together by strong shared motifs. The young Chinese pianist Wynona Yinuo Wang received a decisive boost to her international career when she won the Concert Artists Guild International Competition in New York in 2018. The Italian conductor Carlo Montanaro, the first principle guest conductor of the Hungarian National Philharmonic, enjoys worldwide success and is also extremely popular with Hungarian audiences. A universal musician, he feels particularly at home in the passionate and deeply emotional music of the kind written by Rachmaninov.

Presented by: Hungarian National Philharmonic