Spring 2022

The month of March, they say, comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb. Vaughan Williams compositional style is endlessly evocative of the pastoral, yet always with a touch of sensitivity; he furnishes the solo violin part with unmistakable bird-like features, from recognisable tweets and trills, to light irregular hops, to the swooping flapping of wings in flight. Endlessly sentimental, bursting with sunlight and joyful nostalgia, and one of the best pieces of classical music for spring.

Schumanns’s ‘Spring’ Symphony No. 1 introduces itself with a buoyant, busy first movement – the composer himself originally subtitled the first movement ‘The beginning of Spring’. followed by an uplifting, lyrical second, lilting, dance-like third, before an animated, triumphant finale.

According to a popular story, Antonín Dvořák was challenged by a friend to write a set of variations on a seemingly impossible theme. The compositional challenge proved to be far from impossible and unfolds as a thrilling journey in which the composer seems to be saying, “look what I can do!”