I have discovered the secret of death (world premiere)

Program notes

About the Work

This concert includes a world premiere: a new work for mezzo-soprano and orchestra by Hannah Kendall, commissioned by the London Symphony Orchestra and given here for the very first time with Fleur Barron as soloist. Its arresting title, ‘I have discovered the secret of death’, signals the kind of poetic, history-haunted subject matter that runs through Kendall’s work, which often meditates on memory, identity and the legacies of the past.

Kendall is celebrated for music of great delicacy and originality: intricate, layered textures, surprising sonorities, and a quality of allusion and resonance rather than blunt statement. As a brand-new piece, it comes to its first audience without preconceptions. On the evidence of her other work, we can expect music that rewards close attention, that engages the voice in a searching, text-driven way, and that uses the orchestra with subtlety and imagination. The score even adds a toy piano and small auxiliary instruments to the full orchestra. Placed between Liadov’s enchanted stillness and Tchaikovsky’s fateful drama, it represents the living art of the symphony orchestra, with the LSO bringing a significant new voice to the stage.

What to Listen For

Come to this premiere with open ears: there is no recording, no familiar shape to anticipate. Listen for how Kendall sets the solo mezzo-soprano voice against the orchestra, the relationship between words and instruments, and the way the text (and that haunting title) shapes the music’s mood and pacing. Kendall’s textures tend to be finely layered and atmospheric rather than grand and declamatory, so listen for detail and colour, for unexpected sonorities and the play of light and shadow in the orchestration. Above all, let Fleur Barron’s voice be your guide through the new terrain, and listen as a distinctive composer adds a new piece to the repertoire before your ears.