All-Ravel Program - Program Notes




BSO 2016/17 Season - Concert Previews show

Summary: Download the Program Notes for this series. BSO Conductor Emeritus Bernard Haitink leads two consecutive weeks of concerts this season, beginning with an all-Ravel program featuring the dazzling mezzo-soprano Susan Graham as soloist in the atmospheric orchestral song cycle Shéhérazade. The composer's Spanish-tinged, pictorial Alborada del gracioso opens the program, and the work Ravel considered his best, the complete "symphonie choréographique" Daphnis and Chloé, concludes it. Ravel wrote this cornerstone of musical impressionism for the famous Ballets Russes, which gave the premiere in Paris in 1912.