Philharmonie de Paris - Home Page

Lettre à Herbert Blomstedt

Musiciens de l’Orchestre de Paris
Chamber Music
Amphithéâtre - Cité de la musique
Duration: about 1h10

Program

Distribution

Jean Sibelius
Quatuor en sol mineur JS 158
Wilhelm Stenhammar
Allegro brillante pour quatuor avec piano
Carl Nielsen
Quatuor à cordes n°2 en sol mineur op. 13
Anton Bruckner
Quintette à cordes en fa majeur
Adagio
Helena Munktell
Kleines trio pour violon, violoncelle et piano
Musiciens de l'Orchestre de Paris
Elsa Benabdallah , violin
Eiichi Chiijiwa , violin
Francisco Lourenço , viola
Hervé Blandinieres , viola
Marie Leclercq , cello
Mathieu Dupouy , harmonium
Emmanuel Strosser , piano

Swedish music naturally takes centre stage in this admiring ‘letter’ from the musicians of the Orchestre de Paris to Herbert Blomstedt, the illustrious senior figure among conductors today, and an incomparable master of sound.

Bruckner’s only major chamber music piece, his Quintet (with two violas) is a score of quasi-symphonic logic, characterised by an audacity and complex polyphony that mirror the speculative depth of Beethoven’s last quartets. Curiously considered ‘too serious’ at its premiere in 1889, Nielsen’s Quartet in G minor in fact radiates balance and freshness.

Reaching far beyond its liturgical function, the art harmonium is an instrument with a rich sound which Sibelius used in his Quartet in G minor, a piece in a single movement based on a theme as lilting as it is warm, followed by superb pieces by other compatriots of Herbert Blomstedt: a small trio by composer Helena Munktell (1852-1919), who studied in France with Vincent d'Indy, and the quartet by Carl Wilhelm Eugen Stenhammar (1871-1927), a pianist and conductor who was himself influenced by Bruckner and Nielsen. 

Getting here

Porte de Pantin station
Paris Underground (Métro) Line 5
Tram 3B 

Address

221 avenue Jean-Jaurès, 75019 Paris