Happy Lunar "Chinese" New Year! This weeks playlist is the first full week of the (lunar) year, so enjoy Ravinia Festival: This Week in Classical Music, and listen to all your favorite works on the anniversaries of their initial premiers. Just click the Spotify logo, or the link above, and add our playlist to your library. We update our playlist every week so there will never be a need to resubscribe! Below is a day-by-day listing of the track selections for this weeks edition of the playlist. We hope you enjoy!
January 23
- 1895: MacDowell: Suite No. 2 (":Indian"), at the old Metropolitan Opera House in New York City, by the Boston Symphony, with Emil Paur conducting; On the same program, MacDowell appeared as the soloist in his own Piano Concerto No. 1
- 1936: Chavez: "Sinfonia India," on a radio broadcast by the Columbia Symphony, conducted by the composer
January 24
- 1875: Saint-Saëns: "Dance macabre" for orchestra, in Paris
- 1946: Stravinsky: "Symphony in Three Movements," by New York Philharmonic, with the composer conducting; This work was commissioned by the New York Philharmonic-Society
January 25
- 1902: Franz Schmidt: Symphony No. 1, in Vienna
- 1957: Walton: Cello Concerto, by the Boston Symphony conducted by Charles Munch, with Gregor Piatigorsky the soloist
January 26
- 1873: Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 2, in Moscow
- 1957: Bernstein: "Candide" Overture (concert version), by New York Philharmonic conducted by the composer; The musical "Candide" had opened at the Martin Beck Theater in New York City on December 1, 1956
January 27
- 1944: Paul Creston: Saxophone Concerto, in New York
- 1947: Stravinsky: Concerto in D, in Basle (Switzerland), by the Basle Chamber Orchestra conducted by Paul Sacher (who commissioned the work)
January 28
- 1828: Schubert: Piano Trio in Bb, Op. 99 (D. 898), at a private performance by Ignaz Schuppanzigh (violin), Josef Linke (cello), and Carl Maria von Bocklet (piano)
- 1897: Glazunov: Symphony No. 5, in London
January 29
- 1826: Schubert: String Quartet in D minor, "Death and the Maiden," as a unrehearsed reading at the Vienna home of Karl and Franz Hacker, two amateur musicians; Schubert, who usually played viola on such occasions, could not perform since he was busy copying out the parts and making last-minute corrections
- 1932: Gershwin: "Second Rhapsody" for piano and orchestra, in Boston, with the Boston Symphony conducted by Serge Koussevitzky and the composer as soloist