The Cleveland Orchestra: ​​Visions and Impressions

About this event

This concert looks at contrasts and musical impressions. Opening with a solitary flute and concluding with the largest and grandest of all pipe instruments — a quartet of musical works speak to the ethereal and momentary nature of music.

Principal flute Joshua Smith performs two exquisitely enigmatic pieces for solo flute — Japanese composer Tōru Takemitsu’s Air and French composer Claude Debussy’s tender Syrinx evoking mythical beauty.

Between these, Franz Welser-Möst leads The Cleveland Orchestra strings in Prokofiev’s whimsical and effervescent Visions fugitives, drawn from an early cycle of piano miniatures. The program concludes with a thundering performance of the 20th century’s most intriguing organ concerto played by Paul Jacobs, “a virtuoso of dazzling technical acumen” (The New York Times).

Programme

Concert – approx. 60 min 

Repertoire

1. TAKEMITSU: Air (for solo flute)

2. PROKOFIEV: Visions fugitives, Opus 22a (15 movements for piano arranged by Rudolf Barshai for string orchestra)

3. DEBUSSY: Syrinx (for solo flute)

4. POULENC: Organ Concerto (for organ, strings, and timpani)

This concert was recorded live in April 2021 at Severance Music Center, Cleveland, OH.