PROGRAMME
conductor Tarmo Peltokoski
violin Daniel Lozakovich
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893)
Violin Concerto in D major, Op. 35 (1878)
• Allegro moderato
• Canzonetta: Andante
• Finale: Allegro vivacissimo intermission
Dmitri Shostakovich (1906-1975)
Symphony No. 7 in C major, ‘Leningrad’ (1941)
• Allegretto
• Moderato (poco allegretto)
• Adagio
• Allegro non troppo
concert ends at around 22.45 / 16.15
Cover: German Staff Map (1941) with marked positions around Leningrad. Photo fjm44.com
Nevski Prospekt in Leningrad during the siege. Photo Boris Kudoyarov (1942), coll. RIA Novosti archive
Most recent performances by our orchestra: Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto: Jun 2023, violin Akiko Suwanai, conductor Lahav Shani (on tour) Shostakovich Symphony No. 7: Apr 2013, conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin
One hour before the start of the concert, Ronald Ent will give an introduction (in Dutch) to the programme, admission €7,50. Tickets are available at the hall, payment by debit card. The introduction is free for Vrienden.
Crisis management
Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto was the product of a failed marriage. Shostakovich completed his Seventh Symphony during the gruelling siege of his home city of Leningrad. It is easy to view these two works as the chronicles of trials endured, but perhaps this perspective would be too simplistic.
New inspiration
Tchaikovsky is often depicted as a composer driven by intense emotions. Indeed, his body of work is coloured by his turbulent emotional life: musical clues as to his innate insecurity and frustration with his homosexual nature are unmistakable. But he was first and foremost a great craftsman whose search for self-expression was never at the expense of his craftsmanship. It is precisely for this reason that his Violin Concerto has earned the status of a timeless masterpiece. It was composed in 1878, shortly following the deepest crisis of his life; and yet, there is little evidence of that in the music.
A year previously, Tchaikovsky paid for his impulsive marriage to a student with a nervous breakdown, which sent him wandering around Europe for months. Yet there is no mourning in his Violin Concerto. Instead it embraces his huge talent for melody on which he could always rely. There were indeed some bright spots during this period of his life. Firstly, he was able to rely on rich widow Nadezjda von Meck for financial support. Secondly, he found inspiration in
his friendship with the fifteen-year younger violinist Iosif Kotek, who made a surprise visit to the composer during his stay by Lake Geneva. During this visit, Kotek played him the solo part of the brand new Symphonie espagnole by Édouard Lalo, a violin concerto that was causing a furore on the European concert platform. It immediately ignited a spark: Tchaikovsky was inspired by Kotek –and by Lalo’s ‘freshness, piquant rhythms and beautifully harmonised melodies’, as he wrote to Von Meck. Less than a month later, he had completed his own Violin Concerto.
Can music stink?
The sunny mood of this work is at odds with the tone of Tchaikovsky’s melancholy letters written over preceding months. It is as though all his bitterness over his failed marriage had suddenly vanished. Whilst it is true that the middle movement sobs with melancholy, passages like this are to be found in his earlier music too; wistfulness is a part of Tchaikovsky’s musical DNA. And it is precisely this Andante that expresses a warm Italian glow, picked up along with the many
folk tunes during Tchaikovsky’s wanderings through Southern Europe. Vitality returns in the final movement, thanks in part to the wholesale incorporation of Russian folk dances, a suggestion of the composer’s readiness for the journey home.
Taken as a whole, one could describe this concerto with precisely the same words with which Tchaikovsky had written about Lalo and his Symphonie espagnole: ‘He does not strive for depth, yet avoids the routine and experiments with form. He is more concerned
with musical beauty than in preserving traditions, as the Germans are wont to do.’
This Violin Concerto has since secured its place at the top of the violin repertoire, despite being roundly criticised at its first performance. The blunt opinion of Viennese critic Eduard Hanslick, in particular, was hard to shake off: ‘Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto fills us with chilling thought that there could be musical works that actually stink when listened to.’ Iosif Kotek, who had amply advised Tchaikovsky on the solo part,
Iosif Kotek and Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky in 1877. Photo Studio Nikolay Borisov, Moscow
dared not include the work in his repertoire. This decision signalled the end of their friendship.
Cannon fodder
Little remained of Tchaikovsky’s romantic image of Russia when Dmitri Shostakovich composed his Seventh Symphony. The piece was largely composed in 1941, under horrendous circumstances. Germany was laying siege to Leningrad, whilst Stalin sent thousands of Russian troops to serve on the front as cannon fodder. However, the mobilisation was a lifesaver for Shostakovich: he was commissioned to maintain Russian morale by broadcasting music over the radio. He composed the first three movements with bullets almost literally flying past his ears. He completed the Finale once evacuated from the front line.
Shostakovich composed the first three movements with bullets almost literally flying past his ears
The work became one of Shostakovich’s most spectacular, but also most reviled symphonies. For the Russian people it became a moving symbol of resistance; for the authorities, ideal propaganda for the outside world. Once smuggled to the West on microfilm it also caused a stir, although not an entirely enthusiastic one. Various critics accused Shostakovich of sensationalism (‘the score to a cheap war film’, one of them wrote), whilst the swelling sound of the march in the first movement was derided as a pale imitation of Ravel’s Boléro. Their opinions left the composer indifferent. ‘This is how I experience war’, he retorted.
The fight against fascism
Viewed in this way, the Seventh Symphony delivers exactly what you would expect from war music. Shostakovich’s own explanation at the work’s premiere was also predictable: following the tumultuous opening is a second movement that is ‘a lyrical pause for breath, full of beautiful memories of times gone by’, whilst the third movement expresses a ‘joie de vivre and adoration of nature’. The final movement depicts ‘the ideal of a great future in which the enemy is defeated’. In its entirety, the work symbolised ‘our struggle against fascism.’
But here, as in many other of his symphonies, we can detect Shostakovich’s characteristic ambiguity. Decades later a number of his closest friends lifted just a corner of the veil: the composer had confided in them that this work was not only intended as a denunciation of the Nazis alone, but of any form of repression and terror – including the Stalin’s reign of terror over his own country. Furthermore, Shostakovich’s public declaration that the opening movement was a representation of Germany’s advancing army proved easy to debunk; it had already been written before the invasion of Russia. Shostakovich expert, Ian MacDonald, has unearthed compelling evidence in this regard. He has identified in the march theme a sequence of six falling notes that initially bear some resemblance to the controversial Deutschlandlied (‘Deutschland über alles’), but which, when this section reaches a climax in a dramatic key change, suddenly appears to quote the Fate Theme from Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony. Shostakovich would surely have intended this to mean something. But what, exactly?
Michiel Cleij
Principal Guest Conductor
Born: Vaasa, Finland
Current position: Music Director Latvia
National Symphony Orchestra, Principal Guest Conductor Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie
Bremen, Music Director Designate Orchestre
National du Capitole de Toulouse, Music Director Designate Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra
Education: piano at Kuula College (Vaasa) and the Sibelius Academy (Helsinki), conducting with Jorma Panula, Sakari Oramo, Hannu Lintu and Jukka-Pekka Saraste
Breakthrough: 2022: positions in Bremen, Riga, Rotterdam, and Toulouse
Subsequently: debuts with Hong Kong Philharmonic, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, RSO Berlin, Konzerthaus Orchester Berlin, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, SWR Symphonieorchester, Göteborgs Symfoniker, Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, Los Angeles Philharmonic
Debut Rotterdam Philharmonic: 2022
Born: Stockholm, Sweden
Education: : first violin lessons at the age of seven; violin studies at the Karlsruhe University of Music with Josef Rissin; mentored by Eduard Wulfson, Geneva
Breakthrough: 2016: winner Vladimir Spivakov International Violin Competition, contract with Deutsche Grammophon
Subsequently: solo-appearances with Chicago Symphony, Cleveland, Pittsburgh Symphony, Philadelphia, Boston Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, BBC Symphony at BBC Proms, City of Birmingham Symphony, Budapest Festival, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, Seoul Philharmonic
Awards: Festival of Nations Young Artist of the Year 2017, Premio Batuta (Mexico), Excelentia Prize (Spain)
Instrument: ‘ex-Sancy’ 1713 Stradivari loaned by Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton
Debut Rotterdam Philharmonic: 2025
Photo: Eduardus Lee
Tarmo Peltokoski •
Daniel Lozakovich • violin
Photo: Mezzo
Musicians Agenda
Fri 17 October 2025 • 20.15
Sun 19 October 2025 • 14.15
conductor Kazuki Yamada
piano Alexandre Kantorow
Takemitsu How Slow the Wind
Saint-Saëns Piano Concerto No. 5 ‘Egyptian’
Berlioz Symphonie fantastique
Music for Breakfast 1
Sun 26 October 2025 • 10.30
Dudok in het Park musicians and programme: rpho.nl/en
Thu 30 October 2025 • 20.15
Fri 31 October 2025 • 20.15
conductor Robin Ticciati
piano Yuja Wang
Haydn Chaos from The Creation
Ligeti Piano Concerto
Mahler Symphony No. 5
Harry Potter in Concert, part 1
Wed 12 November 2025 • 19.30
Thu 13 November 2025 • 19.30
Fri 14 November 2025 • 19.30
Sat 15 November 2025 • 19.30
Sun 16 November 2025 • 13.30
conductor Justin Freer
Williams Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone
Fri 21 November 2025 • 20.15
Sun 23 November 2025 • 14.15
conductor Bas Wiegers
piano Kirill Gerstein
Ivičević Black Moon Lilith
Adès Piano Concerto Stravinsky Petrushka
Chief Conductor
Lahav Shani
Honorary Conductor
Yannick Nézet-Séguin
Principal Guest Conductor
Tarmo Peltokoski
First Violin
Marieke Blankestijn, Concert Master
Vlad Stanculeasa, Concert Master
Quirine Scheffers
Hed Yaron Meyerson
Saskia Otto
Arno Bons
Rachel Browne
Maria Dingjan
Marie-José Schrijner
Noëmi Bodden
Petra Visser
Sophia Torrenga
Hadewijch Hofland
Annerien Stuker
Alexandra van Beveren
Marie Duquesnoy
Giulio Greci
Second Violin
Charlotte Potgieter
Frank de Groot
Laurens van Vliet
Elina Staphorsius
Jun Yi Dou
Bob Bruyn
Eefje Habraken
Maija Reinikainen
Babette van den Berg
Melanie Broers
Tobias Staub
Sarah Decamps
Viola
Anne Huser
Roman Spitzer
Galahad Samson
José Moura Nunes
Kerstin Bonk
Janine Baller
Francis Saunders
Veronika Lénártová
Rosalinde Kluck
León van den Berg
Olfje van der Klein
Jan Navarro
Cello
Emanuele Silvestri
Gustaw Bafeltowski
Joanna Pachucka
Daniel Petrovitsch
Mario Rio
Eelco Beinema
Carla Schrijner
Pepijn Meeuws
Yi-Ting Fang
Killian White
Paul Stavridis
Double Bass
Matthew Midgley
Ying Lai Green
Jonathan Focquaert
Arjen Leendertz
Ricardo Neto
Javier Clemen Martínez
Flute
Juliette Hurel
Joséphine Olech
Manon Gayet
Flute/piccolo
Beatriz Baião
Oboe
Karel Schoofs
Anja van der Maten
Oboe/Cor Anglais
Ron Tijhuis
Clarinet
Julien Hervé
Bruno Bonansea
Alberto Sánchez García
Clarinet/ Bass Clarinet
Romke-Jan Wijmenga
Bassoon
Pieter Nuytten
Lola Descours
Marianne Prommel
Bassoon/ Contrabassoon
Hans Wisse
Horn
David Fernández Alonso
Felipe Freitas
Wendy Leliveld
Richard Speetjens
Laurens Otto
Pierre Buizer
Trumpet
Alex Elia
Adrián Martínez
Simon Wierenga
Jos Verspagen
Trombone
Pierre Volders
Alexander Verbeek
Remko de Jager
Bass trombone
Rommert Groenhof
Tuba
Martijn van Rijswijk
Timpani/ Percussion
Danny van de Wal
Ronald Ent
Martijn Boom
Harp
Albane Baron
