Dudamel Leads Prokofiev & Stravinsky

Former LA Phil Music & Artistic Director Gustavo Dudamel returns to Walt Disney Concert Hall with a program of rhythmic wonders. Prokofiev’s Fifth is the composer’s self-proclaimed “symphony on the greatness of the human soul.” The symphony has “everything,” Dudamel says. “It’s lyrical, rhythmical work of great sensitivity. It’s full of power, but it also contains some very intimate moments to provide contrast…During Stalin’s regime, much of Prokofiev’s music was banned but never the Fifth Symphony because it’s a work of natural beauty and grandeur.” Much like Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring, Symphony in Three Movements is rapturous, rhythmically delirious, and marked by punchy chords and quirky riffs. Close your eyes and it feels youthful and exhilarating like Bernstein’s West Side Story yet dark and whimsical like a Danny Elfman-Tim Burton creation. Dudamel opens the program with a brand-new work by Zosha Di Castri—“a composer of riotously inventive works” (The New Yorker).