Christ on the Mount of Olives

Marrying emotive force with theatrically, Sir Simon Rattle sheds light on a rarely performed Beethoven masterpiece and Berg’s lyrical Violin Concerto with Lisa Batiashvili.

Lisa Batiashvili brings sensitivity and supple technique to Berg’s Violin Concerto, an ode to lost youth composed after the death of Alma Gropius’ daughter, aged just 18. Berg did not survive to hear the piece’s premiere of the concerto, which combines experimentation with lyrical melodies, ending with variations based on a hymn tune by Bach.

In the words of Sir Simon Rattle, Beethoven is ‘absolutely inescapable’, especially in the year of his 250th anniversary. Nevertheless, Christ on the Mount of Olives is a rarely heard masterpiece which combines the emotive force of the composer’s later Missa Solemnis with the theatre of a Bach Passion. With orchestra, chorus and soloists, it tells the story of Jesus’ prayer and arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane.