Handel Strikes the Strings

Handel's Concerto grosso No. 9 and a bit of the "Royal Fireworks" start us off. Selections from Mozart's "Magic Flute" add to the evening's enchantment, before we whirl off into "Petrouchka"—the second ballet that Stravinsky composed for Diaghilev and the Ballets Russes—as Claudio Abbado and the London Symphony Orchestra bring us the story of the ill-fated puppet/clown. And don't miss the magnificent Midori's performance of Poulenc's Violin Sonata, a work dedicated to the memory of Federico Garcia Lorca, the Spanish poet murdered in 1936 by Franco's Falangists. Near the end of the final movement, you can almost hear those gunshots...
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