Concertgebouworkest

About

Few orchestras carry as much weight as the Concertgebouworkest, the Amsterdam ensemble whose programmes regularly stretch across centuries and styles. Their concert choices tend to be serious and purposeful: think Shostakovich's haunting Babi Yar symphony paired with Schoenberg's A Survivor from Warsaw, two works that force a reckoning with the horrors of the Second World War. That same appetite for depth shows up when they turn to the late Rachmaninoff, whose Symphonic Dances and Paganini Rhapsody balance sweeping Romantic feeling with echoes of Russian church music and American big band sounds. The orchestra is equally at home in the eighteenth century, exploring rarities like a reconstructed Bach violin concerto or Handel's double orchestra showpieces. Guest conductors and soloists shape each programme distinctly, giving the ensemble a chameleon quality without ever losing its core identity as a major symphonic force.