Brahms 4

Brahms waited until he reached full creative maturity to begin his four symphonies, true monuments of 19th-century symphonic language. Symphony no. 4, 1885, is the composer’s farewell to the symphonic genre and the culmination of a tradition begun by Haydn and Beethoven. The third major descending interval that heads the initial movement becomes a structural and motivic foundation throughout the piece, while the final movement takes the model of the Baroque chaconnes, with a descending ostinato taken from Johann Sebastian Bach's Cantata 150 and elaborated along successive variations until climaxing in an ending soaked in the initial tragic pathos.
Joan Magrané, guest composer at L'Auditori during the 2021-2022 season, premieres Abglanz (Reflex) for soprano, choir and orchestra, a commissioned work based on two poems from the Book of Suleika in the East-West Divan, by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. The author takes advantage of the use of the filigree and the orientalising tone — from the European point of view — of the texts to introduce them within his particular sound world.