László Lajtha: Suite No. 3, op. 56
Franz Schubert–Franz Liszt: Wanderer Fantasy
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Franz Schubert: Rosamunde – excerpts from the incidental music

Peter Klimo piano

Gertrúd Wittinger voice

Hungarian National Choir (choirmaster: Csaba Somos)
Hungarian National Philharmonic Orchestra

Conductor: Nimrod David Pfeffer

Rarities lead 2-1: a look through the selections for the Hungarian National Philharmonic Orchestra’s Lajtha-Schubert might elicit some appreciative nods. Since the Third Suite by Bartók and Kodály’s contemporary László Lajtha is hardly ever performed, it will be exciting to hear it played in its complete form. Liszt’s transcription adding orchestral accompaniment to Schubert’s Wanderer Fantasy, originally written for solo piano and here being performed by a Hungarian-American soloist, is also only rarely encountered. The Israeli guest conductor will then cap off the programme with a better-known treat: excerpts from the Incidental Music to Rosamunde.

László Lajtha was a prominent composer and folk music researcher of the generation that came a decade after Bartók and Kodály, with both folk traditions and French music serving as important influences in his work. Dating from 1952 and with a tone that is appropriately light and entertaining for a celebratory occasion, his Suite No. 3 was written for the centenary of the Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra. Schubert composed his Wanderer Fantasy in 1822, incorporating and developing in it the melody from his noted song Der Wanderer. Franz Liszt, discovering the opportunity to create a piano concerto out of the four-movement composition he admired so much, crafted an orchestral transcription of the work in 1851. Schubert wrote his incidental music consisting of atmospheric character movements to the Germany female writer Helmina von Chézy’s play Rosamunde, Princess of Cyprus in 1823, a year after completing the Wanderer Fantasy.

Hungarian-American pianist Peter Klimo was born in Los Angeles in 1990. This will not be his first appearance as a soloist with the Hungarian National Philharmonic, and he took third prize at the Bartók World Competition in Budapest in 2019.

Born in 1984, Nimrod David Pfeffer studied under Alan Gilbert at the Juilliard School. A successful opera and concert conductor, he serves as the music director at the Lyric Opera Company of Guatemala. In 2017, he took third place at the Maestro Solti International Conducting Competition.