Estimated duration

2 h, incl. intermission

Organizer

Helsingin kaupunginorkesteri

Petrushka is in love with a ballerina, but the ballerina wants the villain of the story, the Moor, who is Petrushka’s enemy. The story does not have a happ

Jukka-Pekka Saraste, conductor
Marko Ylönen, cello

Igor Stravinsky: Fireworks
Witold Lutosławski: Cello Concerto
Igor Stravinsky: Petrushka (1911)

Stravinsky used the collage technique in his Petrushka, which showed that he was up to date with the times: at the same time, artists such as Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque were using newspaper clippings as material for their works.

Witold Lutosławski’s Cello Concerto begins in a striking way: the cellist plays the D note alone, monotonously, every second. Lutosławski’s own view of the situation resembles a description of the meditating mind: “I think of the D note as a moment of complete relaxation or even distraction. The performer abandons this state of mind as soon as something else starts happening and returns to it several times during the introduction.”