Under the baton of Philipp von Steinaecker, the final concert of the Slovenian Philharmonic Orchestra’s Blue Subscription Series will feature the exceptional Slovenian clarinettist of the younger generation, Blaž Šparovec, winner of the first prize in the Carl Nielsen International Competition in 2019. He also serves as the principal clarinettist of the Gürzenich Orchestra Cologne and a lecturer at the University of Arts in Berlin. The concert programme emphasises the colourfulness of the great orchestral composers.

Šparovec will perform the First Rhapsody for clarinet and orchestra by Claude Debussy and the Concerto for Clarinet, Strings and Harp by Aaron Copland, written after a commission from renowned clarinettist Benny Goodman and imbued with jazz rhythms. In the orchestral opus of Lucijan Marija Škerjanc, in addition to symphonies, symphonic poems, suites, concertos and other orchestral compositions, there are also four overtures created between 1925 and 1961, the last of which is the Festive Overture. Symphonic poems take a special place in the creative opus of Richard Strauss. The tenth and last of these works is the Alpine Symphony, which was written in the period 1911–1915 and conceived for a massive orchestral formation. The substantive background of this magnificent work is a picturesque view of a day in the Alps. With this music, the listener travels from the night and the sunrise, through pleasant admiration of the natural environment during the ascent to the summit, all the way to dangerous moments on the wrong path and enduring a storm, and finally to the sunset and into the night. Strauss wrote the work based on his own experience in the mountains, as well as under the influence of the philosophical thoughts of Friedrich Nietzsche.

Text used courtesy of https://www.cd-cc.si/​​​​​​​.