Thu, 27. 1. 2022, 7.00 p.m.

B4 BRAUNER ŽÍTKOVSKÁ | GODDESS

Venue: Zlín Congress Centre  |  Organizer: Filharmonie Bohuslava Martinů, o.p.s.  | 

Our fourth Subscription Series B concert presents works by four composers who frequently drew inspiration from folklore or folk songs.

Leoš Janáček's extraordinary ability to transform folk songs into something quite exceptional has made his name around the world, but it is not folklore that forms the basis of his Adagio for Orchestra. This melancholic late-Romantic piece was written in 1890 in all probability as the composer's immediate reaction in music to the death of his two-year-old son Vladimír.

Like Janáček, Zoltán Kodály was a passionate collector of folk songs, and naturally this was vividly reflected in his own work. In 1926 he wrote Háry János, a folk play incorporating songs and dancing based on an epic verse by the Hungarian poet János Garay. A year later Kodály wrote a six-movement suite based on the events in the original play. The folk music element is present throughout the work, but especially in the Intermezzo, which is a remarkably stylised Hungarian Verbunkos dance where the cimbalom forms part of the core orchestral complement.

The Goddess of Žítková is an orchestral fantasy by the Olomouc-based composer, musicologist and educator Jan Vičar. The title of the piece refers to the magic soothsayers in the area of Kopanice, Moravia, who for centuries carried out folk healing, exorcisms and fortune-telling. It is not in itself a work of musical folklore, but draws its inspiration from a folk theme. A very evocative piece, it consists of four contrasting parts - Žítková, Vyškovec, Zaříkání bouře (Exorcism of the Storm) and Chabová - and uses a female voice in the third part. The role of the beguiling Goddess of Žítková is sung by the Czech mezzo-soprano Barbora de Nunes-Cambraia, who frequently appears in Czech and international opera productions.

The evening ends with the bustling Rhapsody on Moldavian Themes by the Polish composer Mieczysław Weinberg. The piece is a colourful medley of Moldavian folk tunes, both fiery and melancholy, and culminates in a joyful and unstoppable dance.
Tonight's programme is conducted by Tomáš Brauner.