Les Ambassadeurs – La Grande Écurie; Chœur de Chambre de Namur

Alexis Kossenko conductor
Lucile Richardot alto
Julien Dran tenor
Edwin Fardini baryton
Stephan MacLeod bass

Felix Mendelssohn
Die erste Walpurgisnacht, op. 60
Concerto for violin and orchestra in E minor, op. 64

In his ballad Die erste Walpurgisnacht, Goethe describes how the people, prevented by the clergy from celebrating the pagan rite of May 1st, decide to play a trick on the Christians and terrorise them by dressing up and summoning an army of pseudo-witches and false demons. Just imagine what can happen when an orchestral virtuoso like Mendelssohn decides to set such a Sabbath night to music! He conjures up a vehement storm as an overture, and then mischievous, fairy or evil beings seem to come out of every pore of the music. They’re there, they’re wriggling, they’re stirring, they’re giggling, they’re boiling, and all of a sudden they explode in a gigantic sabbath that makes the listener lose all his bearings, literally dizzy from the witches’ whirlwind!
Mendelssohn’s violin concerto, a contemporary of his great cantata, will be the mirror image, in a programme that is as rare as it is tantalising.
Alexis Kossenko, a long-standing accomplice of Gli Angeli, a dear friend and a wonderful musician, is coming to Geneva at the head of his Ambassadeurs – La Grande Écurie and the Chœur de Chambre de Namur for a concert that is already a landmark, both because of its wonderful programme and because it is part of the already historic Mendelssohn Complete Works that the conductor and his orchestra have recently embarked upon.

The concert will be introduced by Mr Philippe Albèra at 4.15 pm.