‘Belgian National Orchestra, Wolff & Eberle’

Conductor emeritus Hugh Wolff opens the concert with the Farewell Serenade by Ukrainian composer Valentyn Silvestrov. Star soloist Veronika Eberle then plays Shostakovich's First Violin Concerto.

Tchaikovsky wrote most of his Second Symphony in 1872, during a summer holiday in Kamianka, in what is now Ukraine, while visiting his sister's family, the Davydovs, whose estate was Tchaikovsky's favourite hideaway. This is reflected in the Second Symphony, in which he incorporated many Ukrainian folk songs. "The real credit for the finale goes to Peter Gerasimovich", Tchaikovsky once joked, referring to the old butler who sang him the hymn The Crane, the starting point for the finale.