New Year’s Eve in Prague

What if there were another ‘Beautiful Danube’ – apart from Johann Strauss’s – to enchant our end-of-year celebrations? With his waltz *Legends of the Danube*, Julius Fučik (the composer of *The Gladiators’ March*) takes us on a three-beat journey down the majestic river, which flows through so many countries in Central Europe yet narrowly bypasses his native Bohemia. But Smetana brings us back to the banks of the Vltava in this first part of the programme, in which the Lyon National Orchestra celebrates the regions and rhythms of the Czech provinces. In the second half, the Originální Pražský Synkopický Orchestr (literally: the Original Prague Syncopated Orchestra) takes centre stage for a leap into the past: here we are in the interwar period, amidst the euphoria of the First Czechoslovak Republic, swinging to the sounds of blues and jazz reconstructed with the utmost historical accuracy.

Programme
First half:
Antonín Dvořák, Carnival Overture, Op. 92, B169
Bedřich Smetana, Vltava [The Moldau] (excerpt from Má vlast, My Homeland)
Bedřich Smetana, Prodaná nevěsta [The Bartered Bride]: Polka – Furiant – Skočna
Zdeněk Fibich, V podvečer [At Dusk], symphonic poem, Op. 39 (excerpt)
Julius Fučik, Dunajské pověsti [Donausagen/Legends of the Danube], waltz, Op. 233
Antonín Dvořák, Slavonic Dances, Op. 72/1, 72/2, 46/3 and 72/7

Line-up
Part 1:
Lyon National Orchestra
Stefan Veselka, conductor

Part 2:
Originální Pražský Synkopický Orchestr