World-class cellist Rohan de Saram to perform with SOSL

“Rohan de Saram is a cello phenomenon, one of the greatest of our time” -Kolinsche Rundschau (Cologne)

As the curtain raiser to its 50th Golden Jubilee season, 2007, the Symphony Orchestra of Sri Lanka will welcome Sri Lankan-born cellist Rohan de Saram as the guest artist at its opening concert on Sunday, February 25 at Ananda College’s Kularatne Hall. Rohan will perform Tchaikovsky’s Variations on a Rococo Theme with the orchestra. SOSL will also perform Beethoven’s great Third Symphony, the Eroica and Weber’s delightful Overture to Oberon. The concert will be conducted by Ajit Abeysekera.

The set of Variations on a Rococo Theme is one of the most familiar of Tchaikovsky’s concert pieces. The theme, original to Tchaikovsky, has a graceful formality and elegance reminiscent of the 18th century. The cello is prominent throughout and there is great beauty in the solo writing, as well as passages of vivacity and brilliance, which make it a virtuoso show piece of the finest order. Overall, whilst unmistakably Tchaikovsky, the work has a lightness and grace in the style of Mozart, whom Tchaikovsky so revered.

Although more recently known as an outstanding performer of contemporary music, Rohan de Saram made his name as a classical artist as a teenager and in his twenties and thirties. Having studied cello from the age of 11 with Gaspar Cassado in Siena and Florence, he was awarded, aged 17, the coveted Suggia award to study in the UK with John Barbirolli and in Puerto Rico with Pablo Casals. At the invitation of Dmitri Mitropoulos, who described him in 1957 as “a rare genius... a born musician... an amazing cellist”, Rohan gave his Carnegie Hall debut in 1960 with the New York Philharmonic, playing Khatchaturian’s Cello Concerto.

Rohan has performed with the major orchestras of Europe, USA, Canada, Australia and the former Soviet Union with conductors such as John Barbirolli, Adrian Boult, Zubin Mehta, Seiji Ozawa and William Steinberg. He has worked with Kodaly, Shostakovich, Poulenc and Walton, as well as more recently with many leading contemporary composers conducting their own works such as Luciano Berio. Berio wrote for him his final Sequenza, no XIV, for solo cello which, as a tribute to Rohan, includes large sections based on the rhythms of the Kandyan drum of Sri Lanka, an instrument which Rohan himself has played since his childhood in Sri Lanka.