M E D I A  A D V I S O R Y

February 23, 2018 – Richmond Virginia – Guest conductor Danail Rachev will lead the Richmond Symphony in the Casual Fridays concert, Pictures at an Exhibition on Friday, March 9 at 6:30 pm. The concert will be held in the Dominion Energy Center’s Carpenter Theatre.

The program features Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition.

Modest Mussorgsky wrote Pictures at an Exhibition as a tribute to his dear friend, artist Viktor Hartmann. In its original execution, Pictures at an Exhibition was a gorgeous piece meant simply for a solo pianist; it became a masterpiece after Maurice Ravel gave the piece a lush orchestration treatment, still heralding the piano as the star. The piece itself conveys the impression of walking aimlessly through an exhibition perusing works of art.

The piece musically illustrates art that was part of a memorial exhibition of over 400 Hartmann works in the Imperial Academy of Arts in Saint Petersburg in February and March 1874. Mussorgsky even lent two pictures Hartmann had given him to the exhibition, and viewed the show in person. Soon after Mussorgsky was inspired to compose Pictures at an Exhibition in just twenty days. Ravel’s orchestration of the work is one of the most popular pieces in all of classical music.

Casual Fridays is our series for experimentation, and we are thrilled to have two partners providing a combination of curated visual art and close-up, live video projections of this performance of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition! You will be able to experience this concert in greater detail…even down to how quickly our violinists’ hands move.

The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts will be pairing works of art from their collection with movements from Pictures at an Exhibition to enhance this concert experience. Videography will be provided by The Richard T. Robertson School of Media and Culture, VCU.

Also, please join us for an exclusive post-concert after party with Symphony musicians, just across Broad Street at Vagabond.

Adult tickets for Casual Fridays performances start at $15, College student single tickets are $5, and Child tickets are free for ages 18 and under. Purchase tickets online at richmondsymphony.com or by calling 1.800.514.ETIX.

The series sponsor is Dominion Energy. This concert is in partnership with VMFA and The Richard T. Robertson School of Media and Culture, VCU.