23 March premiere at The Concertgebouw, Amsterdam

Young composer Mathilde Wantenaar writes a new work for the Groot Omroepkoor. Also: Sofia Gubaidoelina's near-spiritual Sonnengesang and sacred music by Tchaikovsky.

Choral works by Gubaidoelina and Tchaikovsky

In 1997, Sofia Gubaidoelina, nestrix of modern Russian music, composed a new work for Mstislav Rostropovich, who celebrated his 70th birthday that year. Sonnengesang, after a poem by Francis of Assisi, is a meditation on creation, life and death. Higher timbre research for solo cello enters into a spiritual alliance with ingenious choral passages in the score, in which Gubaidoelina audibly harks back to Orthodox church hymns. Tchaikovsky also drew on Slavic church music when he wrote his Nine Spiritual Pieces in 1885. The result: timeless, stately beauty for choir a cappella.

New commissioned work by Mathilde Wantenaar

The young Dutch composer Mathilde Wantenaar impressed at the 2016 Opera Forward Festival with her chamber opera Personar, in which the choir plays a major role. With a brand new work for the Groot Omroepkoor, Wantenaar makes her debut at the NTR Saturday Matinee.