Pictures at an Exhibition

Originally a piano work by the Russian composer Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky, it was created as a tribute to his late friend Viktor Hartmann, whose artworks inspired Mussorgsky, but pianists did not play the original Pictures at an Exhibition very often. That changed thanks to the French composer Maurice Ravel, who arranged the piano pieces for orchestra in 1922. In its “new garb”, the work became a sensation in the concert hall, by far Mussorgsky’s most frequently played and best loved composition. How did the composer feel while writing it? “…notes and ideas fly about like roasted pigeons (as the saying goes), and I gorge myself until I am stuffed, hardly able to scribble it all down on paper. (…) I want to do it quickly and reliably. So far, I think my work is going well.”

The programme is based on a musical part but also on a spoken word that will be given in Czech language only. The programme will not be supplied with English subtitles.