Introducing the London Symphony Orchestra with Lisa Batiashvili
Children love his magical sound creations in the Harry Potter saga, teenagers the brass section in Star Wars, and we adults like the touching soundtracks to Braveheart or Notting Hill. Yet the idea to found the London Symphony Orchestra sprang up on the train from London to Manchester! So prosaically an orchestra was born that for 120 years has ranked among the best ensembles in the world.
On 29 May 2025, they are going to perform at the Prague Spring with their Chief Conductor Sir Antonio Pappano in the Smetana Hall of the Municipal House. Returning to the festival after twenty years, he comes with an impressive programme of works by Richard Strauss, Hector Berlioz and the late Romantic Polish composer Karol Szymanowski, whose Concerto for Violin and Orchestra No 1 – a secret declaration of love to the violinist Paweł Kochanski – will be played by Tbilisi native Lisa Batiashvili. Last year’s Artist-in-Residence of the Berliner Philharmoniker will not only perform with the London Symphony Orchestra this season, but also with the Los Angeles and New York Philharmonics and the Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam, among others.
The second half of the evening will feature Richard Strauss’s magnificent symphonic poem Ein Heldenleben (A Hero’s Life), the work that requires a large orchestra, among others eight horns, five trumpets, a large percussion section and more than sixty string instruments. The LSO – one of the most eagerly anticipated orchestras of the Prague Spring 2025 – will perform in Municipal House’s Smetana Hall in full force and splendour!
