Antonin Dvořák’s only Cello Concerto is an intensely personal work, inspired in part by the fading health of his first love – and cellist Leonard Elschenbroich, a former ±«Óãtv Radio 3 New Generation Artist, will bring his trademark flair to this towering tour de force. Also tonight, conductor Anja Bihlmaier takes us to Russia: first with a witty set of sports-inspired miniatures by Galina Ustvolskaya, a pupil of Shostakovich when the Second World War began; and then with Shostakovich’s own brilliantly irreverent Ninth Symphony, written in 1945 but far from a victory march.
