An afternoon concert filled with devils, mythical creatures and ghosts! Brace yourselves!

Le Conte fantastique (1923) by André Caplet is a chamber music work for harp and string quartet inspired by Edgar Allan Poe’s The Masque of the Red Death, in which the plague decimates a masked ball. The work reflects the terrifying atmosphere of Poe’s story. The main character, Prince Prospero, locks himself in a fortified abbey to escape the “Red Death” that is ravaging his country. Despite the festivities, death intrudes on the ball: when the clock strikes midnight, death enters disguised behind a devilish mask. The music reflects the contrast between the decadent party and the horror of the disease, culminating in a dance macabre and a ghostly ending.

Igor Stravinsky’s The Firebird (1910) is a groundbreaking ballet and orchestral masterpiece commissioned by Sergei Diaghilev for the Ballets Russes. The Firebird tells the story of the downfall of a powerful, ogre-like figure of evil, Kastchei the Immortal, who captures young princesses and turns the knights who come to rescue them into stone. The protagonist, Crown Prince Ivan, enlists the help of the Firebird, so named because of her beautiful feathers that glisten and flicker like flames, to destroy Kastchei and free his victims.   The score is known for its sharp rhythmic and harmonic contrasts, often using dissonance to represent magical/evil characters and consonance for human characters. In this spectacular version for piano quatre mains, the Firebird promises fireworks!

Beethoven’s Piano Trio in D major, Op. 70, No. 1, known as the “Ghost Trio”, is a crucial masterpiece from his middle period. The trio owes its nickname “Ghost” to a comment made after Beethoven’s death. Carl Czerny, a former pupil of Beethoven, wrote in 1842 that the astonishing slow movement “resembles an apparition from the underworld. One might think of the first appearance of the ghost in Hamlet, and that would not be inappropriate”. The nickname stuck to the entire trio.