Dmitri Jurowski, who comes from a Russian musical dynasty, opens the second symphony concert with a work by Polish composer, pianist and musicologist Krzysztof Meyer, born in 1943. Meyer’s veneration of the Romanticist Brahms, but also his closeness to his friend Dmitri Shostakovich, are audible in his “Hommage à Brahms”, which starts with a citation from Brahms’ 1st symphony.
Shortly before writing his 1st symphony, Brahms used his “Variations on a Theme by Haydn” as an incremental approach to writing in the large-scale symphony format. He produced eight arrangements of the unusual, five-bar choral theme from the “Chorale St. Antoni”, though Haydn’s authorship of the choral is today contentious.
In his “Neue Zeitschrift für Musik“, Robert Schumann in 1840 wrote about Franz Schubert’s 8th symphony, “Those who do not know this symphony, no little of Schubert.” Who knows what could have followed on from this symphony if Schubert had not shortly afterwards died too young?