Berliner Philharmoniker: Semyon Bychkov and Víkingur Ólafsson with Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 5

While the Napoleonic Wars raged, Ludwig van Beethoven composed one of his most radiant works: the Fifth Piano Concerto. With its heroic, optimistic character, it faces the challenges of the time, yet also transports the listener with transcendent melodies to better worlds. Víkingur Ólafsson is the soloist. Semyon Bychkov then conducts Dmitri Shostakovich’s Fifth Symphony, composed in the shadow of Stalinist terror. At first glance monumental and triumphant, it reveals an ironic double meaning – a subversive work that feigns jubilation while simultaneously undermining it.