Sydney Symphony Orchestra / David Robertson

When Californian exile Erich Wolfgang Korngold reappeared on the scene in 1947, his Violin Concerto was criticised for sounding like a movie soundtrack. But things were actually the other way round: Hollywood sounded more and more like Korngold. The large-scale symphonic sound, the sophisticated orchestration, the lush violins and the creative use of old forms, songs and rhythms – Viennese composers had been writing music like this for a long time. Not least Gustav Mahler had made a significant contribution to the development of this style. Thus it is perhaps no coincidence that the Adagietto from Mahler’s Fifth Symphony became famous from its use in the soundtrack to Visconti’s legendary film »Death in Venice«. With Renaud Capuçon, who already made an acclaimed recording of Korngold’s Violin Concerto in 2009, the Sydney Symphony Orchestra makes a very apt connection between these two composers.