Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage, an orchestral concert overture by Felix Mendelssohn, was inspired by Goethe’s verses and tells of sailing in the days before steam, when a totally calm sea was cause for alarm; it is only when the wind at last rises that the ship can continue on its journey. Seventy years later, in his orchestral masterpiece Enigma Variations, Edward Elgar quotes a theme from this overture to evoke the journey of one of his friends on a ship bound for Australia or New Zealand. Also that evening, Chinese Violin virtuoso Ziyu He will perform Alban Berg’s demanding Violin Concerto To the Memory of an Angel, dedicated to Manon Gropius, the late 18-year-old daughter of Mahler’s widow Alma and Walter Gropius, a famous German architect and founder of the Bauhaus School.

Program Notes