Turin, the Rai Orchestra conducted by Andrés Orozco-Estrada opens the 2025–26 Season with Mahler's Third Symphony.

Thursday October 9 (8.30 pm) atRai Auditorium "Arturo Toscanini" from Turin kicks off there Season 2025 – 26 ofRai National Symphony Orchestra: the Principal Conductor steps onto the podium Andrés Orozco-Estrada; at her side, the mezzo-soprano Anke Vondung, on Maghini Women's Choir and the Children's choir of the Teatro Regio.

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of Alessio Tonietti *

The secret heart of every musical work, that mysterious energy to be caressed, awakened, set in motion Andrés Orozco-Estrada He always knows how to find it. He may never be the master of "the smallest passage," of the precious detail. But he knows how to ignite the profound meaning of music. And he knows how to share it with everyone, musicians and audiences, with his dances and his theatrical gestures.My attitude towards music has never been too disciplined. The spirit with which I begin each new work is always playful, and that's how I discovered every piece of music.Perhaps this is the secret to a rare gift that everyone recognizes in him: his ability to make brass instruments expressive. Since working in the USA – with the Houston Symphony Orchestra – the Colombian conductor has found his own personal language for bringing color to these instruments, whether it's works by Haydn or Stravinsky. 

The brass will start from an explosion of nine horns in unison. 2025-26 season ofRai National Orchestra and Orozco-Estrada, its principal director since 2023 – Thursday 9th and Friday 10th October toToscanini Auditorium in Turin. From Third Symphony of Mahler and from its gigantic staff – a reinforced orchestra, the Maghini Female Choir directed by Claudio Chiavazza, on Children's Choir of the Teatro Regio of Turin directed by Claudio Fenoglio, for a total of 164 musicians on stage. To find this gigantic work on the Rai Orchestra's programme, we must go back to 1999 and the memorable performance conducted by Giuseppe Sinopoli. 

The program itself is inherently excessive, a journey from the brutality of primordial nature, dotted with eruptions and floods, to the limpid clarity of divine Love.

Everything is gigantic in the first movement. Forty minutes of terrifying forces unleashed, clashes between titans, sudden, tense silences. From here begins a long journey—over an hour and a half—that leads to the weightless transfiguration of the Finale, marked by the softness of the strings. In the middle is a very sweet Minuet that suggests the scent of spring flowers—the piece's success was such at the time that Mahler was forced to propose it again as a single piece. Becoming a painter of exquisite flowers was probably not part of the composer's dreams. The third movement, however, is marked by the famous Cornet da Postiglione, the instrument of carriages, the sound of nostalgia, and of all that has been lost. At this point the "Song of the NightNietzsche's " swallows up any other form of life, the orchestral immobility reveals the weightless singing of the mezzo-soprano Anke Vondung and brings its truths back into the memoryless silence. This is perhaps the most intense moment of the symphony. The sparkle of the female choir and the children's singing precedes the grand Finale with the strings. A long, emotional prayer to the divinity, perhaps a little too wordy and solemn, but certainly effective in resolving the symphony's countless tensions. And bringing this imposing, storm-torn vessel to safe shore. 

* Alessio Tonietti He graduated in Composition; he writes music and soundtracks; he has been a freelance journalist for over twenty years and collaborates with various Italian magazines and newspapers.