National Orchestra of Belgium

For the four-day festival that the National Orchestra is devoting to Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky, it will be accompanied by the Ukrainian-Israeli violinist Vadim Guzman. This former pupil of the famous soloist and teacher Isaac Stern is the perfect man to interpret the Violin Concerto. In a previous life the Stradivarius he plays belonged to Leopold Auer, a Hungarian violinist to whom Tchaikovsky dedicated this work. The Violin Concerto is preceded and followed on the programme by two lesser known works by this most Western of Russian composers. Voyevoda is a symphonic ballad based on a story written by the Polish national poet Adam Mickiewicz while Suite no. 3 is a series of variations full of lively dance rhythms.