Sheku – Concerto – Blossom Music Festival, USA

Programme

BRITTEN  Simple Symphony

SAINT-SAËNS  Cello Concerto No. 1

MENDELSSOHN Symphony No. 3, “Scottish”

“I think I have found there the beginning of my ‘Scottish’ Symphony,” Mendelssohn wrote in 1829after visiting the ruins of Edinburgh’s Holyrood Chapel. At once dramatic and lighthearted, the resulting symphony is a vibrant musical postcard of Mendelssohn’s travels. Conductor Stephanie Childress returns to lead this work alongside Saint-Saëns’s melodious First Cello Concerto — featuring superstar cellist Sheku Kanneh-Mason — and Britten’s Simple Symphony, a delightful piece the composer based on tunes he had written as a child