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World Premiere of Pēteris Vasks's Oboe Concerto

Oct. 01, 2018

World Premiere of Pēteris Vasks's <em>Oboe Concerto</em>

On October 5-6, the Latvian National Symphony Orchestra, led by Andris Poga, open their season with the world premiere of Pēteris Vasks's Oboe Concerto in Riga’s Great Guild, Latvia, featuring the internationally acclaimed Albrecht Mayer as soloist.

Vasks’s Oboe Concerto was commissioned by the LNSO in celebration of 100 years of Latvian independence, with support from Latvia’s Centenary Celebration programme. To mark the occasion, Vasks has written the Oboe Concerto as an ode to his home country, its nature, and people. It is also a long-awaited solo piece for oboist Albrecht Mayer, who has been asking Vasks to compose a work for him for many years. Vasks notes:

"The Oboe Concerto consists of three movements: the first is a morning pastorale, the second a festive scene, the third – an evening pastorale … I strived to imbue the work with my idea and sense of nature’s inexhaustible vitality and my people’s unceasing spirit."


The concerto is bookended by two pastoral movements: in the first – a morning nature scene – the oboe unfolds in extended cantilena passages above string tremolos and birdsong motifs in the woodwind. The dramatic atmosphere of the contrasting central movement, with its fiery folk dances, arioso passages and extended cadenza, gradually flows into the peaceful ‘evening pastoral scene’, mirroring the beginning of the work. The program also includes Vasks's Musica appassionata for string orchestra.

Please enjoy Pēteris Vasks's The Fruit of Silence, version for SATB chorus and string orchestra, (2014):


(The Fruit of Silence/Pēteris Vasks/Latvian Radio Choir and Sinfonietta Rīga/Sigvards Kļava, conductor)

To learn more about Pēteris Vasks, please visit schott-music.com.

Pēteris Vasks
Oboe Concerto (2017-2018)
for oboe and orchestra
2.2(2.eh).2(2.bcl).2-2.2.0.0-timp.2perc-str
27'

Musica appassionata (2002)
for string orchestra
18'

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