Join the Â鶹ԼÅÄ Philharmonic for a studio concert with conductor Elena Schwarz.
Today, we hear two works written just after the Second World War by a pair of Swiss composers both of whom were enjoying fruitful, stable periods in their careers by the late 1940s. Frank Martin and Arthur Honegger were born within a couple of years of each other (1890 and 1892 respectively) and both excelled in large-scale works for chorus and orchestra.
Martin showed an early, natural flair for improvisation as a child when he began to devise tunes at the piano prior to receiving any formal musical tuition, and he would go on to teach improvisation and theory of rhythm at the Institut Jaques-Dalcroze in Geneva. His ‘mysterious, elegant’ Concerto for Seven Winds, completed in 1949, demonstrates Martin’s virtuosic skill for composition, the lyrical air of the piece giving away little of the technical dexterity involved in achieving its balance and ease.
Another master of his craft, Honegger wrote his Symphony No. 4, Deliciæ Basiliensis (the delights of Basel) following a vacation he had just taken in the Swiss countryside. The work, which was commissioned by Swiss patron of the arts, Paul Sacher, premiered on this day, 21 January, in 1947, and sounds just as compelling 76 years on.