London Symphony Orchestra

The London Symphony Orchestra is widely regarded as one of the world's leading orchestras. Its many activities include an energetic and ground-breaking education and community programme, a record company (LSO Live), and exciting work in the field of information technology.

Over a century after it was formed, the LSO still attracts the best players, many of whom also have flourishing solo and chamber music careers. The LSO also draws on an enviable roster of soloists and conductors, starting with Principal Conductor Valery Gergiev, LSO President Sir Colin Davis, and Daniel Harding and Michael Tilson Thomas as Principal Guest Conductors.

LSO St Luke's, the music education centre on Old Street, continues to expand its artistic programme with top artists from diverse musical backgrounds, and LSO Discovery is facilitating music education using new technology, and building stronger links with the local communities. LSO Live is the best-selling orchestral own-label in the world and is regularly No 1 in the classical downloads charts on iTunes.

Continuing the orchestra's long association with film music, the LSO has recently recorded soundtracks for Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. The orchestra also features on radio, TV, computer games and in-flight music programmes.

The conductor

François-Xavier Roth

Born in 1971, the young French conductor François-Xavier Roth graduated from the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Paris where he studied with Alain Marion and Janos Fürst.

In October 2000, he was a winner of the ‘Donatella Flick Conducting Competition’ in London and became assistant-conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra for 2 years.

François-Xavier Roth has been invited to conduct orchestras including: the Orchestre de Paris; the national orchestras of Toulouse, Lyon, Strasbourg and Lille; the Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique; the Orchestre Poitou Charentes; and the Orchestre d’Auvergne.

Internationally he has conducted, among others, the Symphonic Orchestras of Barcelona, Navarra, the Sinfonia Varsovia, the Bejiing Opera Orchestra and the Tokyo Mozart Players.

In July 2007, he made his debut in North America with the London Symphony Orchestra, conducting Beethoven’s 9th symphony at the Florida International Festival.

He also has strong relationships with the Ensemble Intercontemporain and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales - orchestras which he conducts several times each season.  He has also been invited to conduct an opera production each year for The Theatre in Caen. François-Xavier Roth has been nominated Principal Guest Conductor at the Orchestra of Navarra (Spain) for the seasons 2008/2009 and 2009/2010.

The music

Symphony No.10 in E minor (Op.93) by Dmitri Shostakovich (1906-1975)

Shostakovich ranks amongst the greatest composers of the twentieth century. He also had an extraordinary life. Feted early on, he was denounced by the state in 1936 and 1948. For many other artists and intellectuals this meant either years in a labour camp in Siberia or execution. What saved him from the gulag was his international reputation, which Stalin (paradoxically) was keen to foster. The dilemma for Shostakovich was how to escape his own "final solution" yet retain his integrity. He managed to achieve this through his music, writing enough official works to satisfy the communist party while retaining a significant part of his creative energy for more personal pieces which were often published and performed many years later.

Symphony No.10 was written just after Stalin's death in 1953. It is in four movements and has become one of his best-loved scores. The first movement is conceived on a huge scale and builds from a quiet, low opening to a central section of incredible, menacing power which then gradually fades back to a quiet ending.

The short second movement is a savage portrait of a savage man - Stalin. Shostakovich was capable of writing music of tremendous intensity and this is a great example.

The Symphony's third movement is altogether different, a gentler portrait, combining themes derived from two names: Shostakovich’s own and Elmira Nazirova, a student who he wrote to every day as he composed the Tenth Symphony.

The last movement starts, as the first, with cellos and basses and with almost identical music before Shostakovich introduces a perky almost inconsequential theme. It is this juxtaposition of a trite melody with the overwhelming music that follows that makes Shostakovich's music so extraordinary.

The Russian conductor Kirill Kondrashin knew Shostakovich, lived under the same conditions and conducted all of Shostakovich’s symphonies. Here are his thoughts on the Tenth Symphony: “At nineteen, Shostakovich was creatively mature, open and enthusiastic and he remained like that until his death - so much so that even the illnesses, injustices and persecutions he suffered could be absorbed into his major works. The Tenth Symphony is like that - reflecting those problems, protesting against them and in the end transcending them”.