Beethoven: The 1808 Vienna Concert at Arts Centre Melbourne Hamer Hall

With a line-up of internationally acclaimed soloists and the Royal Melbourne Philharmonic Choir joining the Orchestra for this rare event, we invite you to sit back and relax in the company of one of music’s greatest creative minds. In December 1808, Beethoven – acting as promoter, conductor and concert pianist – staged a remarkable concert in Vienna’s Theater an der Wien which premiered several of the most influential works in music history. Works will be performed in the original order of the 1808 Concert. With time to catch up with fellow music-lovers for dinner and drinks during two extended interval breaks, this is a special night in the MSO’s calendar not to be missed!

5pm – 6:15pm
BEETHOVEN’S SIXTH SYMPHONY
Symphony No.6 Pastoral
Ah! perfido
Mass in C: Gloria

Bursting with unrestrained joy and endlessly flowing melodies, Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony is an intoxicating tableau of country life, harking back to a time of lost innocence. It is contrasted with Ah! perfido, an aria of the eighteenth-century operatic tradition exhibiting Mozart’s influence, intensely reflecting the protagonist’s feelings of betrayal by the man she loves, and the thrilling Gloria from the Mass in C major.

7:30pm – 8:45pm
BEETHOVEN’S FIFTH SYMPHONY
Piano Concerto No.4
Symphony No.5

Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony – which contains the most famous four notes ever written – remains one of the most influential orchestral works of all time. It is joined by his lyrical and imaginative Piano Concerto No.4, a work that for its time, redefined the limits of piano concerto repertoire.

9:30pm – 10:15pm
BEETHOVEN’S CHORAL FANTASY
Mass in C: Sanctus and Benedictus
Fantasia for Piano
Choral Fantasy

The creative culmination to all the concert music that precedes it, Beethoven’s Choral Fantasy is a work like no other: a dazzling piano solo, a concerto and a large-scale choral work rolled into one, paving the way for the composer’s gamechanging Ninth Symphony. The Sanctus and Benedictus from Beethoven’s Mass in C open the program.