Rain date: Sunday, 28 June

RAIN DAY RULES AND INFORMATION

250th anniversary of the birth of the composer For more than 60 years in the town of Martonvásár, the Hungarian National Philharmonic Orchestra’s concert series Beethoven in the Park has provided an unrivalled classical music experience for the summer season.

This year’s event – the 62nd – promises to be a truly special occasion. We will pay tribute to the 250th birthday of the Viennese maestro as part of Martonvásár’s Beethoven Anniversary Year programmes. On this celebratory occasion, the audience will enjoy the composer’s remarkable works across five nights, instead of the usual three.

And with the help of some prestigious Hungarian solo performers, all nine of Beethoven’s symphonies will be performed in Brunswick Castle’s beautiful park. The conductor for the concerts will be Zsolt Hamar, the musical director of the Hungarian National Philharmonic Orchestra.

Composed in 1806, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 4 is remarkably diverse. The introduction to the first movement almost allows a glimpse into the creative process, conveying how the composer struggled to find the starting theme of the rapid passage. Over the course of the work, Beethoven gleefully plays with stubbornly recurring rhythmic formulas and deceptive shifts in emphasis. The concert aria Ah! perfido was first performed in 1796, in Leipzig. Consisting of a recitative and an aria, the dramatic scena depicts the anguish of a woman who has been abandoned by her beloved.

The four movements of the Symphony No. 3, which was composed between 1802 and 1804, could be the portrait of a hero. The opening movement of the first movement returns in gloriously transfigured form at its end. This is followed by a scherzo, a funeral march and, finally, a movement of variations – including one in a Hungarian verbunkos style – on a German dance, tune. Beethoven originally subtitled the symphony „Buonaparte”, but changed this to Eroica after Napoleon crowned himself emperor.