BR photo from last night’s concert; Symphony of Psalms
Friday, October 2, 2026
Isarphilharmonie, Munich
Stravinsky, one of Sir Simon’s signature composers, but would the Russian be identifiable by the ‘lost and found’ Chant funèbre, music that is maybe of greater interest for having been written by him, as a memorial to Rimsky-Korsakov, than the end result, which might be thought somewhat anonymous, despite this fine performance. Symphony of Psalms is the real Stravinskian deal, written for Boston and Koussevitzky (but the conductor’s illness meant that the Ansermet-led second performance became the premiere, Boston getting it a few days later). Unusually scored – no violins or violas, a woodwind section without clarinets, if five flutes, standard brass, and two pianos. Setting verses from respectively Psalms 38, 39 & 150, Rattle was conspicuously quick in the first movement, asking much of the orchestra, which responded with deft rhythmic interplay while the BR Chorus was lusty, adjusting to plaintive for the next movement, then ethereal for the final one, something planetary created, with the faster music giving horns the opportunity to brilliantly etch their moment of jubilation before the music fades to spatial stillness, to which Le roi des étoiles (The King of the Stars, or Zvezdoliki) was a sonorous complexly chordal riposte, men’s chorus and large orchestra, loud, modernist, and a neighbour to The Rite of Spring. Opening with an expressive bassoon solo that stole in, a sense of seasonal re-grouping was palpable, although in some passages in both parts tempos were on the fast side, a showpiece tending to undermine the score, yet the opening of part two was atmospheric and darkly coloured. By the time of the ‘Sacrificial Dance’, something beyond the notes was evident, the BRSO superb (as throughout), Rattle ensuring a perfectly timed last-breath pause before the maiden fell to the ground, and doing so with one hell of a bang, unequivocally dead.
Igor Stravinsky
Chant funèbre, op.5
Symphony of Psalms for choir and orchestra
Le roi des étoiles for men’s choir and orchestra
Le sacre du printemps
““The Psalms are poems of exaltation, but also of anger and judgment, and even of curses,” wrote Igor Stravinsky about his Symphony of Psalms. The work was composed during a time of personal tragedy. Tuberculosis had afflicted the composer’s family: his wife and his eldest daughter contracted the disease and eventually died from it. “It is not a work that offers easy consolation, and the God it portrays can be stern, even cruel,” says Sir Simon Rattle. Yet the symphony is equally suffused with moments of otherworldly serenity and beauty. It is framed by the sombre Chant funèbre, the otherworldly five-minute miniature Le roi des étoiles (which Debussy deemed performable only on “Sirius and Aldebaran”), and the once-scandalous classic Le sacre du printemps. An all-Stravinsky concert, rich in contrasts, colours, and surprises.” [BR]