Pre-Concert Talk: Esa-Pekka Salonen and John Florance

The Philharmonia Orchestra’s Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor, Esa-Pekka Salonen, chats with journalist John Florance ahead of a concert of Mahler’s 1st Symphony and Beethoven’s 2nd Piano Concerto at De Montfort Hall in Leicester on 10 April 2018. Topics cover Gustav Mahler and Jean Sibelius’s famous encounter in Finland and their differing opinions of what a symphony should contain, the power of provocation in music, and Esa-Pekka Salonen’s own struggle to balance composing, conducting and life.

This concert repeats in London at Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall on Thursday 12 April 2018 at 7:30pm. Book here: https://www.philharmonia.co.uk/concerts/1752

Please note: Audience questions have been edited out due to being inaudible on the recording - we cut straight to the panellist answers.