It may be a masterpiece, but Alexander Zemlinsky's Lyric Symphony remains a rarity in the classical repertoire and is seldom performed in concerts. That is why the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra has chosen this work by the Austrian composer for this year's Hong Kong Arts Festival.
'The festival always likes something a bit more special. What's the point if we just do another subscription concert? So I thought Zemlinsky would be very special,' says the orchestra's artistic director and chief conductor, Edo de Waart.
'It is a particularly wonderful work; and it's a Hong Kong premiere.'
Written in the early 1920s, the Lyric Symphony is a collection of seven songs for soprano, baritone and orchestra based on the poems of Indian poet and Nobel Prize laureate Rabindranath Tagore. They tell of love and parting, and the exotic poetry, with its mystical and spiritual allusions, inspired Zemlinsky to pen what was arguably his best work.
It regained popularity in recent decades after surviving the second world war, when much music written by Austrian composers around the time was either neglected or destroyed. Zemlinsky left Vienna for the United States in 1938 and settled in New York, where he remained, virtually unknown, until his death at age 70 in 1942.
De Waart says it's hard to explain what makes the Lyric Symphony a gem without falling into cliches, but points out how well the music reflects the text. The composer chose seven poems from Tagore's collection, entitled The Gardener.