Philharmonia/Mackerras

Royal Festival Hall, LondonThe Romantics made much of the idea of nature as a place of beauty and peril that offered an escape from the oppressions of mundane existence. The second of Charles Mackerras's Philharmonia concerts toyed with contrasting natural perspectives by prefacing excerpts from Humperdinck's Hansel and Gretel with Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony. Both works are characterised by a sense of wonder at a world that seems close yet unfamiliar, and which can turn from benign to threate...

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