LSO Discovery

Miguel del Aguila is a Uruguayan composer. After study at the San Francisco Conservatory and in Vienna, Aguila made his home in California. He has won many awards including three Latin Grammy nominations. Today’s piece, Wind Quintet No 2, was awarded a Kennedy Center Friedheim Award for excellence just after its premiere in 1994.

Spanning four movements, it describes an undisclosed story taking the listener into four distinct places. The second movement is called ‘In Heaven’ and is written in the style of a relaxed Caribbean dance. At the beginning the players use new playing techniques such as tapping on the mouthpieces to simulate the sound of a distant percussion band.

_{Note by Rachel Leach}

1 Allegro
2 Andante
3 Rondeau

Francis Poulenc was born into a very wealthy and successful Parisian family; his father controlled the massive chemical company Rhone-Poulenc, a firm which is still going strong today.

Young Francis Poulenc had access to the very best teachers. His first influences were fellow French geniuses Debussy and Ravel, but as a young man he turned against this when he met Erik Satie and joined Les Six – a group of six like-minded composers intent on stirring things up a bit.

The Sonata for horn, trumpet and trombone (1922) comes from this period. Inspired by Stravinsky’s Neo-Classical masterpiece Pulcinella, Poulenc gives us a tiny trio which sounds like music from 200 years before with a very 20th century twist. In 1945, Poulenc revised the piece and dismissed it as simply ‘an entertainment’. It has three movements – Allegro, Andante and Rondeau – and lasts less than eight minutes.

_{Note by Rachel Leach}

Johann Sebastian Bach was born into a musical family in Leipzig in 1685. At 15 he became a chorister and quickly mastered the organ and violin. As an adult he worked as a court composer and organist. He married twice and had 20 children, two of which became well-respected composers.

Bach produced a huge amount of music featuring an unprecedented command of contrapuntalism (several lines of music intertwining), tonality and spirituality (all his works were dedicated to the Glory of God). Bach died in 1750 and during the final months of his life he was totally blind. His first biographer said: 'He is the river to which all other composers are the tributaries'.

This piece was probably written in around 1707 for a keyboard instrument called the Lute-Harpsichord, but it is now often played on guitar or lute, and today is being played on a marimba. A gigue is a lively dance in three-time.

_{Note by Rachel Leach}

Hector Berlioz was one of the most flamboyant composers of the Romantic period. He lived in France and was hugely influenced throughout his life by Beethoven, Shakespeare and the Romantic literature of the day. He led an emotionally charged life and his music reflects this. It is big, loud, exciting, and extremely rich and vivid.

The Grande symphonie funèbre et triomphale was his fourth and final symphony. Written in 1840 to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the July revolution, Berlioz chose to use only brass and woodwind instruments (ideally 200 of them!) and in doing so wrote the first ever ‘military band’ symphony. The piece was so successful that Berlioz did eventually add optional strings and chorus. His friend, composer Richard Wagner, called the final version ‘so sublime that it can never be surpassed’. This is a new arrangement of extracts from the first movement ‘Funeral March’ by trombonist Jim Maynard.

_{Note by Rachel Leach}

Established in 1947, the US-based Music Academy (formerly known as the Music Academy of the West) celebrates its 75th anniversary in 2022. The Academy is among the nation’s preeminent summer schools and festivals for gifted, young, classically trained musicians. At its ocean-side campus in Santa Barbara, the Academy provides musicians with the opportunity for advanced study and performance under the guidance of internationally renowned faculty artists, guest conductors, and soloists.

The partnership between Music Academy and the London Symphony Orchestra, launched in summer 2018, is based at the Academy’s annual Summer School and Festival in Santa Barbara, California, and at the Barbican and LSO St Luke’s in London. The Academy Fellows are gifted young instrumentalists (aged 18–34) from America and around the world, accepted annually into the Academy’s summer school, all on full scholarships, enabling talented musicians from a variety of backgrounds to participate.

As part of the partnership, Music Academy fellows are selected by audition by LSO Members to visit London and take part in rehearsals, performances and training alongside the LSO, to continue their professional development. The LSO enjoyed a successful visit to Santa Barbara in March 2022, performing three concerts with Sir Simon Rattle, and LSO players will be returning in July 2022 to coach the fellows and select fellows to visit London in November 2022.

Today's Performers

Devan Jaquez flute *
Victoria Chung oboe *
Sara Han clarinet *
Bianca Chambul bassoon *
Angela Barnes horn
Alex Mayon trumpet *
Paul Milner bass trombone
Jonathan Wisner percussion *

* Music Academy Fellows

Click each name to read a biography.

Friday 1 July 12.30pm

Daniel Kidane Movements for Piano and Strings (world premiere)
Aaron Copland Vitebsk

Naoko Keatley violin
Alix Lagasse violin
Mitzi Gardner violin
Joonas Pekonen violin
Malcolm Johnston viola
Peteris Sokolovskis cello
Tom Goodman double bass
Philip Moore piano
Rachel Leach presenter

Autumn 2022

Friday 23 September 12.30pm
Friday 14 October 12.30pm
Friday 11 November 12.30pm (Relaxed performance)