ANDERS HILLBORG: Cold Heat
LISZT: Piano Concerto No. 2 in A major, LW H6
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ZEMLINSKY: The Mermaid, Symphonic Fantasy*
“Jean-Yves Thibaudet has a way of combining an often wild virtuosity with an almost relaxed grace that sets him apart from many other performers of his generation!” raved the Chicago Sun-Times of Thibaudet. Always a compelling Liszt interpreter, on this program he’ll take on the Second Concerto, full of inventive transformations of themes and shifts in mood.
A work illustrating the season theme of "enchantment," Zemlinsky’s rendering of Hans Christian Andersen’s tale of The Mermaid, a story popularized by Disney’s The Little Mermaid interpretation, was composed in the aftermath of Alma Schindler’s rejection of him in favor of Gustav Mahler. As in the Liszt concerto, you’ll hear striking changes in themes which illustrate the sea, the storm, the heaviness of unrequited love, and the mermaid’s eventual metamorphosis into an eternal spirit of the air.
