For every concert in our Southbank Centre series, we ask one of our players to write a little note for audience members to read as they leave the concert hall. Here’s what our violin Julia Kuhn wrote about our States of Independence concert on Friday 31 May 2019 at Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall.

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Dear members of the audience,

Thank you for coming to tonight’s concert with the OAE, Alina Ibragimova and Thierry Fischer!

For me, it’s a joy to explore this repertoire from a historical performance point of view and play it on the appropriate instruments to further explore the means of expression available in the later half of the 19th century,

The whispering gut strings pianissimo of the mournful melodies in the second movement of Sibelius’ symphony or the raw, triumphant outbursts of the brass instruments in the last movement are only two examples of how we can use these instruments and techniques to really make this symphony ‘a confession of the soul’ (Sibelius’ description of the symphony!).

The Strauss violin concerto was an unknown piece to most of us and whilst being a youthful work and, admittedly, not quite the Strauss we know, it has a charming air to it, especially in the last movement.

Thanks again for coming to our concert and I hope to see you in many more.