Summary: Listen in to the Concert Preview! Andris Nelsons' two January programs focus on classics of the orchestral repertoire. In this first program of 2015 he is joined by French cellist Gautier Capuçon and BSO principal violist Steven Ansell for Strauss's rollicking, wide-ranging tone poem Don Quixote, which depicts musically several episodes from Cervantes's novel. Brahms's Variations on a Theme by Haydn, whose theme is the famous "Chorale St. Anthony" (likely not by Haydn after all), was originally composed for two pianos but is, in its orchestral guise, a major symphonic feat. Haydn himself is also featured in this program. Following the great success of the six so-called "Paris" symphonies, the composer wrote three more for his admirers in that city, nos. 90-92, in 1788-89. No. 90-a favorite of Maestro Nelsons'-includes a famous "false" ending in the first movement, one of Haydn's wittiest musical jokes.
