Victoria Borisova-Ollas: Orchestral Works Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra & Sakari Oramo, Andrey Boreyko, Martyn Brabbins

• Victoria Borisova-Ollas (b. 1969):
• 1 Angelus 22:07
• 2 The Kingdom of Silence 14:25
• 3 Before the Mountains Were Born 17:58
• Creation of the Hymn (Version for String Orchestra):
• 4 Creation of the Hymn (Version for String Orchestra): Solenne, risoluto e con tutta forza 02:41
• 5 Creation of the Hymn (Version for String Orchestra): Allegretto - Giocoso 01:32
• 6 Creation of the Hymn (Version for String Orchestra): Tranquillo 02:11
• 7 Creation of the Hymn (Version for String Orchestra): Allegro, energico 03:08
• 8 Creation of the Hymn (Version for String Orchestra): Largo, espressivo 01:57
• 9 Creation of the Hymn (Version for String Orchestra): Calmo 03:41
• Victoria Borisova-Ollas:
• 10 Open Ground 10:53
• Total Runtime 01:20:33

Info for Victoria Borisova-Ollas: Orchestral Works

Born in Russia, Victoria Borisova-Ollas has lived in Sweden since 1993. In the international music press, she has been described as ‘a composer with a sparkling individual voice’ and an ‘orchestrator of the greatest virtuosity’. This is borne out by this wellfilled disc which features five works from 2003 – 2013, in performances by the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra (RSPO) with which BorisovaOllas enjoys a collaboration of long standing.

Angelus, which opens the disc, is also the longest work with a duration of some 22 minutes. It was composed for the 850th anniversary of the city of Munich and takes the listener on a walk through the city and its many clock towers. Angelus is conducted by Andrey Boreyko, who has championed the music of Borisova-Ollas for many years and who here also conducts Creation of the Hymn, a reworking by the composer of a piece for string quartet. Martyn Brabbins has also been entrusted with two works, including Before the Mountains Were Born. Composed in 2005 for the RSO Stuttgart, it includes a virtuosic ‘cadenza’ for the four of the principal woodwind players (flute, oboe, clarinet and bassoon). In the final work on the disc, Open Ground, it is Sakari Oramo, chief conductor of the RSPO, who brings out the towering chords and ethereal shimmerings of Borisova-Ollas’ score.

Joakim Svenheden, violin
Johannes Rostamo, cello
Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra
Andrey Boreyko, conductor
Martyn Brabbins, conductor
Sakari Oramo, conductor

The Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra
was founded in 1902 and Konserthuset Stockholm has been its home since 1926. The orchestra gives around 100 concerts annually and participates in the festivities associated with the Nobel Prize Award Ceremony. Noted for its ambitious programming, composer festivals with contemporary music and pioneering work on a more gender balanced repertoire, the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra is very much present in today’s music life.

Regular guest conductors include notable names such as Riccardo Muti, Andris Nelsons, Herbert Blomstedt, Nathalie Stutzmann, Gianandrea Noseda and Conductor Laureate Alan Gilbert. Recently, the acclaimed conductor Franz Welser-Möst was awarded the new title Eric Ericson Honorary Chair from the orchestra. He joins the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra for two weeks each season starting 2020/21.

Finnish Sakari Oramo has been Chief Conductor and Artistic Director of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic since 2008. 2020/21 will be his final season in this capacity. Sakari Oramo and the orchestra has carried out several successful tours. The German newspaper Die Welt recently concluded that the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic is “one of the world’s best orchestras”.

The orchestra has also received considerable attention for several recordings with Sakari Oramo; among them Carl Nielsen’s symphonies were critically acclaimed internationally and the recording of Symphonies Nos. 1 and 3 received a BBC Music Magazine Award 2016. The CD Sirens, with music by Anders Hillborg, won a 2016 Swedish Grammy Award. The CD Distant Light, with the world-renowned American soprano Renée Fleming, was released by Decca in 2017.

KonserthusetPlay.se is the orchestra’s online concert hall. Launched in 2013 it offers a large selection of filmed performances with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, available for free streaming anywhere in the world.

”The Konserthuset Play platform offers a digital showcase of the orchestra’s recent outings at home, under both its chief conductor, Sakari Oramo, and others, from Karina Canellakis to Herbert Blomstedt. For an invigorating reminder of what a truly world-class band this is, try Brahms’s Second Symphony conducted by Pablo Heras-Casado. It’s a comparatively clean-shaven reading of the piece – stylish rather than high-Romantic – in which the lower strings are velvety, woodwind solos beguile and the brass provide irresistibly high-shine climaxes.” Flora Willson/The Guardian (20 April 2020)

Sakari Oramo
is chief conductor and artistic advisor of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra. He took over the position in 2008 and since his first three-year period with the orchestra, he has renewed the contract several times for additional terms. The season 2020/2021 will be his last as chief conductor of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra.

After Sakari Oramo concluded his period as chief conductor of the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, he was appointed chief conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra, with which he has participated in several Proms concerts since 2013, including Last Night of the Proms. He was one of the founders and chief conductor of the Karleby Opera, as well as chief conductor of the Ostrobothnian Chamber Orchestra, having succeeded Juha Kangas in 2013.

His musical curiosity has continuously manifested in sterling work with new music. Sakari Oramo is also an excellent violinist, and was previously concertmaster of the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra. He reveals this side of his musical expertise every season at Konserthuset, partly through chamber music concerts, though he has also been a soloist with the orchestra.

While he was concertmaster of the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, he began studying conducting with Jorma Panula at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki. In 2004, Oramo was appointed Honorary Doctor at the University of Central England in Birmingham, in recognition of his “outstanding contribution to the musical life of the city”, for the years he spent as chief conductor of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra. He was also appointed an Honorary Officer of the British Empire (OBE) by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II in recognition of his contributions to British music life. In 2008, Oramo was awarded the Elgar Medal in recognition of his dedication to Edward Elgar’s music and as a reflection of his enormous interest in British music in general.

Oramo has conducted orchestras such as the Berlin Philharmonic, the Vienna Philharmonic, the San Francisco Symphony, the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, Staatskapelle Dresden, the Oslo Philharmonic, the New York Philharmonic, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre de Paris, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and more. He has also conducted opera, including the Finnish National Opera.

Sakari Oramo is represented on many records, primarily as the conductor, but also as a violinist and chamber musician (including on Warner Classics, Ondine, Philips and Hyperion). Oramo and the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra’s recordings of, among other things, all six of Carl Nielsen’s symphonies on three albums (BIS) have been critically acclaimed globally, and the album with Symphonies No. 1 and 3 received the BBC Music Magazine Award for best orchestral recording in 2016.

In the 2019 Gramophone Classical Music Awards, Oramo and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra were winners of the Orchestral category, for the cd with Rued Langgaard Symphonies 2 & 6: ”A mandatory purchase for its interpretative insights, committed playing and tangibly realistic sound.”

Other recordings with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra from recent years include two albums with music by Anders Hillborg (BIS) – which both won Grammis Awards in the best classical album category. Also worth mentioning are the recordings of all of Schumann’s symphonies by the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra (Sony Classical), which were received with high praise by the international press. And the latest record, Distant Lights, with Renée Fleming as soloist with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra and Sakari Oramo, has received glowing reviews all over the world.

In 2012, Sakari Oramo was elected as a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Music. In 2016, Sakari Oramo was named Conductor of the Year by the historic Royal Philharmonic Society in London.

Andrey Boreyko
has been Music Director of the Artis-Naples since September 2014. He has brought a new intensity to the Artis-naples and the Naples Philharmonic with his inspired leadership, commissioning new works and attracting soloists of the highest calibre. The driving force behind the continued artistic growth of Artis-Naples and the Naples Phiharmonic, Boreyko balances traditional repertoire with imaginative, diverse programming for which he has gained a distinguished reputation worldwide.

Boreyko has forged strong long-term relationships with the most prestigious orchestras across Europe. This leads him to appearances next season with the Konzerthausorchester Berlin, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin, and Bamberger Symphoniker, amongst others. Much sought-after as a guest conductor in North America, Boreyko’s versatility and broad repertoire take him to the National Arts Centre Orchestra, Ottawa, as well as re-invitations to San Francisco Symphony, Indianapolis, Cincinnati and Houston symphony orchestras where he is regular guest. A prolific conductor of the great symphonic repertoire and a passionate advocate for less widely known works, Andrey Boreyko champions compositions by Victoria Borisova-Ollas in an extensive concert and recording project with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra this season, debuts with the Gothenburg Symphony, and returns to the Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della Rai and the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra.

Boreyko has also conducted orchestras such as the Berliner Philharmoniker, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Münchner Philharmoniker, Staatskapelle Dresden, Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, Wiener Symphoniker, Filharmonica della Scala, Orchestra del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, Royal Concertgebouw, Orchestre de Paris, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich, London Symphony, the Philharmonia and Rotterdam Philharmonic. In North America, he recently appeared at the Ravinia Festival with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and worked with the New York and Los Angeles philharmonics, The Cleveland and The Philadelphia orchestras and the Toronto, Chicago, Boston, San Francisco, Baltimore, Detroit and Pittsburgh symphony orchestras.

Notable amongst Boreyko’s discography with the Radio-Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart des SWR (with whom he was Principal Guest Conductor) are Pärt’s Lamentate and Silvestrov’s Symphony No.6 (both for ECM records), the premiere recording of his original version of the Suite from Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk and Shostakovich symphonies No.1, 4, 6, 8, 9 and 15 both on Hänssler Classics. He has also recorded Tchaikovsky’s Manfred Symphony with the Düsseldorfer Symphoniker and Lutosławski’s Chain 2 with the Los Angeles Philharmonic for Yarling Records. Another prominent feature of Andrey Boreyko’s artistic versatility is the world-premiere recording of Górecki’s Symphony No.4 with the London Philharmonic Orchestra for Nonesuch, which was subsequently also premiered by the Los Angeles Philharmonic in the US under his direction to considerable acclaim.

From 2012 Andrey Boreyko was Music Director of the Orchestre National de Belgique, a post не held with great commitment for five years, expanding the Orchestra’s activities nationally and internationally. He was Music Director of the Düsseldorf Symphoniker (2009-14) and Chief Conductor of the Jenaer Philharmonie (of whom he is now Honorary Conductor), Winnipeg Symphony and Berner Sinfonieorchester. He received awards for the most innovative concert programming in three consecutive seasons from the Deutscher Musikverleger-Verband – the first in the history of the prize.

Martyn Brabbins
is Music Director of the English National Opera. An inspirational force in British music, Brabbins has had a busy opera career since his early days at the Kirov and more recently at La Scala, the Bayerische Staatsoper, and regularly in Lyon, Amsterdam, Frankfurt and Antwerp. He is a popular figure at the BBC Proms and with most of the leading British orchestras, and regularly visits top international orchestras such as the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Deutsche Symphonie-Orchester Berlin and Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony. Known for his advocacy of British composers, he has also conducted hundreds of world premieres across the globe. He has recorded over 120 CDs to date, including prize-winning discs of operas by Korngold, Harrison Birtwistle and Harvey. He was Associate Principal Conductor of the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra 1994–2005, Principal Guest Conductor of the Royal Flemish Philharmonic 2009–2015, Chief Conductor of the Nagoya Philharmonic 2012–2016, and Artistic Director of the Cheltenham International Festival of Music 2005–2007. He is currently Visiting Professor at the Royal College of Music and Artistic Advisor to the Huddersfield Choral Society alongside his duties at ENO, and has for many years supported professional, student and amateur music-making at the highest level in the UK.

Booklet for Victoria Borisova-Ollas: Orchestral Works