Mussorgsky’s musical gallery visit, rendered expressively through Ravel’s colorful orchestration, is a lasting tribute to an artistic life. Written as a tribute to the painter Victor Hartmann, a dear friend of the composer who died prematurely, the piece transports us from scenes of the countryside to the majestic Great Gate of Kyiv. Cellist Zlatomir Fung makes his debut, joining the orchestra in Tchaikovsky’s elegant ode to Mozart in Variations on a Rococo Theme, which Fung played in his first-prize performance at the International Tchaikovsky Competition. Armenian Austrian conductor Emmanuel Tjeknavorian, also in his Bowl debut, opens the program with Khachaturian’s sabre-rattling Gayane suite, about a young woman’s struggle to escape her abusive husband and find love in the Armenian countryside.
