During the concert of the NFM Leopoldinum Orchestra, the musicians will be accompanied by the eminent violinist Alexander Sitkovetsky. Performed by artists that evening, the legendary Goldberg Variations by the unsurpassed master of polyphony, Johann Sebastian Bach, will be heard.

The Goldberg Variations is a brilliant cycle composed in 1741 as a kind of panacea commissioned by Count Herman Karl von Keyserling, a Russian diplomat struggling with insomnia. At his request, a piece consisting of an aria and thirty variations for harpsichord was created, which were played at night for the count by Bach’s pupil Johann Gottlieb Goldberg. For composing them, the Leipzig Kantor received the highest fee in his life, and the cycle is still one of his most popular works. In the thirty variations we find scores of technical challenges, excellent contrapuntal work, lightness, but also folk motifs or inspirations by German songs. The most important feature of these works, though, is their melodiousness. In each of the variations, the first is a dance, the second is a virtuoso variation, and the last is in the form of a canon.

Apart from the version for piano, the cycle has been extensively arranged, e.g. for organ, harp or orchestra. Despite the fact that the arrangements were not as popular as the original, they soon gained favour of the audiences and began to be played in concert halls around the world. This evening, the work will be performed in an arrangement for violin and string orchestra.