Video a la carta: Lalo and Stravinsky

German-born Clara-Jumi Kang was only four years old when she was accepted as the youngest ever student at the Mannheim Musikhochschuhle. At the age of seven was awarded a full scholarship to the Julliard School of Music in New York. Clara-Jumi Kang, making her debut with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, has won a large number of awards and performs around the world. We will hear her in Frenchman Édouard Lalo’s masterful violin concerto, called the Symphonie espagnole, due to the Spanish-influenced melodies that characterise the piece.

After intermission, Ryan Bancroft – winner of the Malko Competition for Young Conductors in 2018 – leads the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra in Igor Stravinsky’s ballet music Petrushka. At first, the ballet Petrushka was intended as a piano concerto, but impresario Diaghilev recognised its potential as music for a ballet. The action takes place at a Russian carnival on a snowy winter’s day in 1830s Saint Petersburg. The attractions would include a traditional Russian puppet show.

When Stravinsky composed the music, he saw before him the image of a doll that came to life, and tested the orchestra’s patience with demonic cascades of piano arpeggios. Petrushka is a variation on the Italian commedia dell’arte, but with the figures placed in a Russian setting. We hear Petrushka in its concert version.