APO Celebrates the Triumph of the Human Spirit

APO Celebrates the Triumph of the Human Spirit

Russian and Jewish culture take centre stage this week in a dramatic programme of music that honours human courage.

The eighth in this year’s APN News & Media Premier Series concerts, Stier and Shostakovich: A Testimony, opens with Lukas Foss’s powerful Elegy for Anne Frank, followed by Bloch’s Schelomo.

The APO is joined for the latter work by one of the world’s leading exponents of the cello, Peter Bruns.

The evening closes with one of the 20th century’s orchestral masterpieces, Shostakovich’s Symphony No.10, a specialty of APO Music Director Eckehard Stier.

Written during a period following Shostakovich’s denunciation by the Soviet authorities, the symphony was only performed after the death of Joseph Stalin, who is depicted musically in the second movement.

“This is powerful music that deals with weighty themes,” says Barbara Glaser, Chief Executive of Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra. “And yet there’s nothing downbeat about the programme at all; this is an uplifting concert that celebrates the triumph of the human spirit.”

WHO: Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra
WHAT: APN News & Media Series 8: Stier and Shostakovich – A Testimony, featuring works by Foss, Bloch and Shostakovich
WHERE: Auckland Town Hall
WHEN: Thursday 11 August, 8pm

Quick Facts:

- APO Music Director Eckehard Stier has singled this programme out as his favourite of the season.
- Peter Bruns plays a Tononi cello from 1730 once owned by the great Pablo Casals.
- Of Bruns’s CD of Bach’s cello suites, Early Music Review said: “This is one of the best CD recordings of the year – perhaps of the decade.”

ENDS

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