Filmed at the Rudolfinum in Prague, this concert captures world-renowned violinist Lisa Batiashvili’s debut with the Czech Philharmonic. Under the baton of the orchestra’s Principal Guest Conductor Jakub Hrůša, she performs Saint-Saëns’s Third Violin Concerto. Dedicated to and premiered by the legendary Spanish violinist Pablo Sarasate, the concerto is notable for the way in which the virtuosic writing for the soloist is threaded throughout the score, bringing additional drama and decorative qualities to the music.
The programme continues with Brahms’s Classically-inspired and increasingly complex variations on a chorale theme (now thought not to have been written by Haydn). We end with more variations, this time by the Czech composer Dvořák. The theme of the Symphonic Variations comes from “The Fiddler” – one of his own songs for male choir, and the variations that follow its presentation encompass a colourful range of moods, culminating in a fugue which suddenly becomes a lively polka.

Camille Saint-Saëns
Concerto for Violin and Orchestra No. 3 in B minor, Op. 61 (29′)
Johannes Brahms
Variations on a Theme by Joseph Haydn, Op. 56a (19‘)
Antonín Dvořák
Symphonic Variations, Op. 78 (23‘)

Lisa Batiashvili violin
Jakub Hrůša conductor
Czech Philharmonic
Michael Beyer director

Filmed in the Dvořák Hall at the Rudolfinum, Prague