The BBC Philharmonic Orchestra returns to The Bridgewater Hall on Friday 4 December 2026 for a spectacular performance of Richard Strauss’s An Alpine Symphony, conducted by Simone Young, with pianist Cédric Tiberghien joining the orchestra for two works by Robert Schumann.
Few orchestral works can match the sheer scale and ambition of An Alpine Symphony. Completed in 1915, Strauss’s monumental tone poem takes its audience on an eleven-hour journey through the Bavarian Alps, from the darkness before dawn to the mountain summit, through a violent thunderstorm and back into the stillness of night.
The journey unfolds over 50 minutes of music, with Strauss using the full resources of a vast orchestra to bring the landscape to life. It is one of the great achievements of orchestral storytelling, and a rare opportunity to experience the power of a full symphony orchestra at its most spectacular.
An orchestra on a grand scale
Strauss was already celebrated for his ability to tell stories through music, having composed works including Don Juan, Till Eulenspiegel and Also sprach Zarathustra. With An Alpine Symphony, he took this gift for musical description to extraordinary new heights.
The score calls for more than 100 musicians on stage, additional brass players positioned offstage, and an unusual collection of instruments and effects. Alongside the familiar strings, woodwind and brass are cowbells, an organ, a wind machine and a thunder machine. There is even a heckelphone, a rarely heard relative of the oboe, whose rich, dark sound adds another colour to Strauss’s enormous orchestral palette.
Across 22 continuous sections, the music follows the climbers through forests, past waterfalls and across flowering meadows. At the summit, the orchestra opens out into a magnificent musical panorama before the weather takes a dramatic turn. As the climbers begin their descent, the skies darken, thunder crashes and the wind rises, bringing the journey to a thrilling climax.
First performed in Berlin in October 1915, with Strauss himself conducting, the work remains one of the most demanding and exhilarating pieces in the orchestral repertoire.
A conductor with Strauss in her blood
Taking the podium is Australian conductor Simone Young, internationally renowned for her interpretations of the great German Romantic repertoire, particularly the music of Richard Wagner and Richard Strauss.
Young has enjoyed a distinguished career at many of the world’s leading opera houses and concert halls, including a decade as Artistic Director of Hamburg State Opera and General Music Director of the Hamburg Philharmonic State Orchestra.
Her command of Strauss’s richly layered orchestral writing makes her an ideal guide through the changing landscapes of An Alpine Symphony, from its most delicate passages to its overwhelming climaxes.
Schumann’s Romantic imagination
Before the interval, French pianist Cédric Tiberghien joins the BBC Philharmonic for two contrasting works by Robert Schumann: the Konzertstück, Op. 92, and Introduction and Concert Allegro, Op. 134.
Written in 1849 and 1853 respectively, these are fascinating alternatives to the traditional three-movement piano concerto. Both bring the piano and orchestra together in a single continuous work, combining lyrical passages with moments of virtuosity and dramatic intensity.
The earlier Konzertstück begins with a beautiful, atmospheric introduction before launching into a passionate Allegro. The later Introduction and Concert Allegro was presented to Schumann’s wife Clara, herself one of the greatest pianists of the nineteenth century, as a birthday gift in 1853. Dedicated to the young Johannes Brahms, it is among Schumann’s final works for piano and orchestra.
Together, they offer an opportunity to hear a more rarely performed side of Schumann’s musical imagination, brought to life by Tiberghien’s expressive and thoughtful musicianship.
From the intimacy and passion of Schumann to the vast Alpine landscapes of Strauss, this is a programme that reveals the extraordinary range of the Romantic orchestra. And with An Alpine Symphony demanding such remarkable musical forces, it promises to be one of the most impressive orchestral spectacles of our 30th anniversary season.
BBC Philharmonic – Alpine Symphony
BBC Philharmonic Orchestra | Simone Young conductor | Cédric Tiberghien piano | International Concert Series
Friday 4 December 2026, 7.30pm
The Bridgewater Hall, Manchester