Benjamin Grosvenor plays Chopin II | Philharmonia Orchestra

Outstanding British pianist Benjamin Grosvenor joins the Philharmonia in Chopin’s Second Piano Concerto, following his performance of the First in autumn 2022. Grosvenor’s recording of both Chopin concertos, released in 2020, was acclaimed as “thoughtful and fresh” (The Times).

Chopin composed this concerto when he was just 20, to perform on his concert tours. Full of poetry and emotion, its central slow movement is considered by many listeners to be one of the most beautiful things he wrote.

This afternoon’s conductor, Oksana Lyniv, is an influential and committed ambassador for the arts and culture of her native Ukraine. She opens with a symphonic poem by Borys Lyatoshynsky, master orchestrator and one of the foremost Ukrainian composers of the 20th century.

Tchaikovsky’s Pathétique Symphony completes this richly expressive programme. At the height of his powers, Tchaikovsky overturned many of the conventions of the symphony. The second movement, which at first sounds like a graceful waltz, in fact has an unsettling five beats in a bar; the third ends with a blaze of brass and percussion which would have made the perfect triumphant finale; and the actual finale ends with a devastating descent into silence.