Baroque music that grooves, tangos flushed with 18th-century flair… The Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra offers an effervescent musical evening that juxstaposes Vivaldi’s radiant Le Quattro Stagione (“The Four Seasons”) with Astor Piazzolla’s sultry Las cuatro estaciones porteñas (“The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires”).
Composed in the late 1960s for his quintet of piano, bandoneón, violin, electric guitar, and bass, Piazzolla’s work honors Vivaldi’s groundbreaking set of violin concertos while reinterpreting their naturalistic theme from the perspective of his native Argentina and its musical traditions. Although the original work made occasion melodic references to Vivaldi's concertos, it was Leonid Desyatnikov who later arranged the suite for solo violin and string orchestra at the request of violinist Gidon Kremer, and in the process added 15 quotations strengthening the link between the two works. The orchestra’s principal violinists Vesko Eschkenazy and Liviu Prunaru lead their fellow musicians while delivering scintillating interpretations of the solo parts.
