Dvořák 5 

Calliope Tsoupaki—former composer-in-residence for the Netherlands and a close friend of the Residentie Orkest explores in*Falling* howwe seek meaning anew in a world that has become unstable. The piece is compact, just thirteen minutes long, yet intense and full of movement. Mahler then draws the emotion inward with one of his most famous song cycles: theRückert Lieder. Five miniature mirrors in which longing, tranquility, self-examination, and melancholy are laid bare without drama. Barbara Kozelj makes the songs almost tangible with her warm, resonant mezzo. 

InThin Air, Tsoupaki’s second work of the evening, we return to a piece born of compassion and solidarity. Originally written during the pandemic (and Residentie Orkest in this orchestral version by the Residentie Orkest ), yet so timeless that it may resonate even more powerfully now than it did then. Dvořák’s fascinatingFifthconcludes the evening not with spectacle, but with sunlight: warm-blooded, playful, dancing. A symphony that smells of grass, earth, sun, and evening air. It is Dvořák at his most open, most free, and most blissful. Conductor Antony Hermus weaves a magnificent, breathing program between Tsoupaki’s air and Dvořák’s earth.