Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla makes her debut with Prokofiev’s “Romeo and Juliet”

Mieczysław Weinberg – one of Dmitri Shostakovich’s closest friends – left behind a wealth of imaginative and captivating works that were long held in high regard by leading conductors in the Soviet Union. In addition to 22 symphonies and four chamber symphonies, his oeuvre includes seven operas, several concertos, film compositions, numerous chamber music pieces – and two ballets. The first of these, The Golden Key, is based on Tolstoy’s satire of the same name, in which the wooden puppet Buratino (a Russian adaptation of Pinocchio) experiences many hair-raising adventures in the style of the Commedia dell’arte. Weinberg arranged four entire suites from the successful ballet, which is entirely in the tradition of Prokofiev, Shostakovich and Stravinsky. Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla presents the last of these suites on her debut with the Berliner Philharmoniker.

Pianist Emanuel Ax then presents the piano concerto composed for him by film music legend John Williams. It pays homage to jazz greats such as Art Tatum, Bill Evans and Oscar Peterson, while finding its own, highly improvisational language. After the interval, there are excerpts from Sergei Prokofiev’s ballet music after Shakespeare’s tragedy Romeo and Juliet: sharply contoured character sketches full of sophistication, lyrical beauty and dramatic effects. Not surprisingly, Prokofiev’s work went down in music history as one of the most successful dance theatre projects of the 20th century.

Berliner Philharmoniker

Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla

Emanuel Ax