Critic’s Choice
This weekend’s Utah Symphony concerts should appeal both to traditionalists and those who desire something a bit more modern
Music director Thierry Fischer, who’ll be on the podium in Abravanel Hall this weekend, will open and close the program with two wildly popular works: the overture to Rossini’s opera William Tell and Dvorák’s Symphony No. 9, “From the New World.”
Sandwiched between these two concert-hall stalwarts is Henri Dutilleux’s Tout un monde lointain (A Whole Distant World) for cello and orchestra. Written between 1967-70, it was commissioned by Igor Markevitch for Mstislav Rostropovich, who premiered it in 1970 with the Orchestre de Paris.
The work is in five movements, each of which was inspired by poems from Charles Baudelaire’s Le fleurs de mal. Soloist in the Dutilleux is the German cellist Alban Gerhardt, making a return visit to Salt Lake City after an absence of several years.
The concerts will take place 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday in Abravanel Hall. utahsymphony.org; 801-355-2787.