Debussy & Pettersson

Debussy & Pettersson - and Staern's flute concerto Älvalek with Laura Michelin

In 2026, the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra and conductor Christian Lindberg completed their sixteen-year recording project documenting all of Allan Pettersson's orchestral works. This concert continues the journey through Pettersson's music - the orchestra performs his seventh symphony under the direction of chief conductor Karl-Heinz Steffens. The symphony is written in a single long movement, where dark sonorities alternate with beautiful string passages.

Swedish flutist Laura Michelin returns to the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra as soloist in Benjamin Staern's flute concerto Älvalek. The work is inspired by August Malmström's painting of the same name, which hangs in the National Museum in Stockholm. Staern describes it this way: the flute represents the river and the orchestra its choir singing and dancing in a moonlit landscape where rivers flow hand in hand like a thin veil.

The concert opens with Debussy's Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun, a symbolist work in which the faun's flute plays a central role - and which paved the way for modernism.

Programme
Claude Debussy - Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun (approx. 10 min)
Benjamin Staern - Älvalek, flute concerto (approx. 20 min)
Intermission 25 minutes
Allan Pettersson - Symphony No. 7 (approx. 44 min)