On February 6, Lionel Bringuier conducts the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra in a program titled “Musical Fables and Fairytales,” featuring additional soloists, soprano Laura Claycomb, and pianist Jarle Rotevatn. Bringuier leads the program with Ravel’s imaginative fairytale Ma mère l’Oye, with Lutosławski’s poetic and seductive Chantefleurs et Chantefables (Song Flowers and Song Fables) following, featuring Laura Claycomb.

Based on surrealist poetry by the Frenchman Robert Desnos, Bringuier and Ms. Claycomb previously performed the work with Stockholm’s Radio Orchestra and at the Los Angeles Philharmonic. The Los Angeles Times praised Mr. Bringuier’s “dazzling” performance, and both artists’ “beautiful rendering of the cycle’s evocation of moonlight and sleep.”

Stravinsky’s Petrushka, composed in 1911, was based on the Russian folk puppet Petrushka, who would suddenly spring to life and ‘exasperate the orchestra with diabolical cascades of arpeggios.’ The result was Stravinsky’s big stylistic breakthrough, the haunting ballet for Diaghilev Petruskha in which the composer would depict his homeland with ‘quick tempos, major keys, smells of Russian food, sweat, and glistening leather boots.’

Photo credit: Paulo Dutto