Esa-Pekka Salonen conducts world premiere of Shostakovich’s “Orango”

15 November 2011 | Return to News

Esa-Pekka Salonen returns to the Los Angeles Philharmonic in November/December 2011. Salonen, the orchestra’s Conductor Laureate, will conduct two concert series on 25/26/27 November and 2/3/4 December with the world premiere of “Sirens”, a piece by Anders Hillborg dedicated to Esa-Pekka Salonen, as well as the world premiere of the prologue to Dmitri Shostakovich’s unfinished and long-lost opera “Orango”.

The satirical work about the activities of a half-man, half-ape being, commissioned by the Bolshoi Theater to commemorate the 15th anniversary of the October Revolution, was partially written by Shostakovich in 1932.

Russian musicologist Olga Digonskaya, who had been working for Shostakovich’s widow Irina discovered the manuscript for “Orango” in Shostakovich’s archives at the Glinka State Central Museum of Musical Culture in Moscow in 2004. At the request of Irina Shostakovich, composer Gerard McBurney developed the orchestration for “Orango” in 2009. The semi-staged 40-minute piece will be directed by Peter Sellars.

Los Angeles, Walt Disney Concert Hall
25 November, 20.00
26 November, 20.00
27 November, 14.00
Los Angeles Philharmonic
Beethoven: Leonore Overture No. 2
Beethoven: Piano concerto No. 2
Hillborg: Sirens    world premiere   
Anne Sofie von Otter, mezzo-soprano
Hila Plitmann, soprano
Emmanuel Ax, piano
Los Angeles Master Chorale, Grant Gershon

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Los Angeles, Walt Disney Concert Hall
2 December, 20.00
3 December, 20.00
4 December, 14.00
Los Angeles Philharmonic
Schostakowitsch: Orango     world premiere
Schostakowitsch: Symphony No. 4
Peter Sellars, director    
Ben Zamora, lighting designer
Ryan McKinny (The Entertainer), bass-baritone
Jordan Bisch (Voice from the Crowd), bass
Michael Fabiano (Zoologist), tenor
Eugene Brancoveanu (Orango), baritone
Yulia van Doren (Suzanna), soprano
Timur Bekbosunov (Paul Mâche), tenor
Adriana Manfredi (Renée), contralto
Abdiel Gonzalez (Armand Fleury), baritone
Daniel Chaney (Foreigner 1), tenor
Todd Strange (Foreigner 2), tenor
Los Angeles Master Chorale – Grant Gershon, music director

Please click here for more information on these concerts.