HCM CITY – Dutch clarinetist Leon Bosch will perform in a concert at HCM City’s Opera House on Sunday to celebrate the 45 years of diplomatic relations between Việt Nam and the Netherlands.

The event is co-organised by the HCM City Ballet Symphony Orchestra and Opera (HBSO) and the Consulate General of the Netherlands.

Bosch, a professor of clarinet at the Conservatorium Maastricht (Maastricht Academy of Music) in the Netherlands, will open the night with the Clarinet Concerto No. 1 by Spanish film composer Oscar Navarro, who has won many awards for his film scores.

Bosch will continue with the Concert Piece No. 2 in D Minor for two Clarinets and Orchestra written by German composer Felix Mendelssohn in 1833.

He will perform with Vietnamese clarinetist Nguyễn Tuấn Lộc, an instructor at the city’s Conservatory of Music and a member of HBSO’s symphony orchestra.

Bosch studied conducting and the clarinet at Conservatorium Maastricht.

He has performed with the Limburg Symphony Orchestra, Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, WDR Symphony Orchestra in Cologne, and Dutch National Opera.

He was a solo clarinetist for the Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra in 1989, and has worked as a conductor with choruses and choirs, including the Royal Choir Society Mestreechter Staar.

Bosch is now the principal conductor of the Philharmonisch Orkest Mozart in Amsterdam and Symfonisch Blaasorkest Heemstede, and the artistic director and conductor of the Domstad Blazers Ensemble.

The concert’s second half will feature Symphony No. 4 in E Minor composed by Johannes Brahms in 1884. The four-movement symphony premiered in Germany in 1885.

The concert will feature the HBSO orchestra, led by South Korean conductor Lim Jun Oh, who visited the city in April last year to attend a concert on film music.

After studying music in South Korea, Lim continued conducting at the Novosibirsk State Conservatory Mikhail Glinka under the instruction of Professor Evgeni Valierevich Mushkin.

He was conductor of the Magnitogorsk Symphony Orchestra and the Magnitogorsk Ballet and Opera Theatre in Russia.

He has performed in over 700 concerts and festivals in countries such as South Korea, Russia and Việt Nam. He is now a lecturer at Dong-Eui University, and music director and conductor of the New Prime Symphony Orchestra in South Korea.

The concert will begin at 8pm at the Opera House, 7 Lam Sơn Square, in District 1. Tickets are available at the venue’s box office and at www.ticketbox.vn. — VNS