Longstanding Francisco Coll supporter Gustavo Gimeno will conduct Hímnica with the Concertgebouworkest Young on 18 August at the Concertgebouw and then 20 August at the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg.
Hímnica received its world premiere at the KKL Lucerne in 2021, conducted by James Gaffigan. The 10½-minute orchestral work was the first piece Coll wrote for orchestral forces of its size – the same forces as used in Robert Schumann's 4th Symphony. Coll describes the piece as a “a kind of passacaglia, or chaconne, in which a hymnic theme develops in different ways within one adagio tempo”. He continues,
The work contains elements of grotesque humour – traces of a dream-like waltz, for example – but I did not intend to create a pessimistic work. Rather, I hope that it contains beauty and hope. Hímnica begins and ends ‘lontanissimo’, as if its 10-minute span could be a fragment of something larger – or perhaps even something eternal.
On 13 August Hímnica receives its Finnish premiere from the Fiskars Festival Orchestra at the Fiskars Summer Festival.
In the autumn Coll’s Aqua Cinerea receives two performances from Gimeno at the Walt Disney Hall, Los Angeles with the LA Philharmonic; on 27 November Coll conducts the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France in the world premiere of his cello concerto, with Sol Gabetta as soloist.