Thomas Adès returned to the LSO for two specially-curated programmes in October 2025, conducting Aquifer and the London debut of the chamber orchestra version of The Origin of the Harp. They featured alongside three Sibelius symphonies and music by Poul Ruders, Einojuhani Rautavaara and Alex Paxton, with soloists Sean Shibe and Johan Dalene.
Aquifer…rolls and rumbles, thunders and subsides in waves of constant, polychrome orchestral motion. In this flamboyantly high-definition performance, it was an exhilarating send-off.
The Guardian (Flora Willson) 20 October 2025 ****
Aquifer…17 minutes of wriggling subterranean chromatics [that] finally ends in a victory parade of musical sunshine.
The Times (Geoff Brown) 20 October 2025
I reviewed [Aquifer] on CD recently and liked it, but it’s an even more impressive achievement heard live…strong and confident music, Adès at the height of his powers, progressing with the inexorable force of a large body of water towards its dazzling C-major resolution, the orchestra making a glorious, implacable noise.
The Arts Desk (Bernard Hughes) 20 October 2025
Aquifer is a 17-minute work whose material surges and subsides in the manner of an underground channel of water coursing through layers of rock. Premiering with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and Simon Rattle in 2024 and recorded by Adès and The Hallé, Adès conducted it with Gürzenich-Orchester Köln on 5 October, and returns to it with the Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich (where Adès is Creative Chair), the Los Angeles Philharmonic and Boston Symphony in the upcoming season.
Based on a painting by Daniel Maclise, The Origin of the Harp takes as its subject the mock Celtic legend of a water nymph who falls for a mortal, the two separated by their respective element. The Gods, pitying her, intervene and turn her into a harp, her weeping becoming the gentle music of wind across strings; Maclise’s painting catches this moment of metamorphosis.
The first version was created for an ensemble of ten players from the Hallé Orchestra in 1994. Adès conjures the mythic atmosphere with breathy clarinets, glassy string harmonics and an array of unusual percussion instruments. The magical transformation is suggested by fluid, filigree passages in the winds; the harp’s sudden manifestation is suggested by a blizzard of pizzicato strings.
The orchestration was commissioned by the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Gewandhausorchester Leipzig and Aspen Music Festival and School; it premiered with Adès and Scottish Chamber Orchestra in April 2024, before making its German debut with Gemma New at the Gewandhaus in October that same year. New will give a further national premiere of the piece with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra in May 2026 in Wellington and Christchurch.
Adès’ music returns to the Barbican on 7 November, when Christian Tetzlaff performs the Violin Concerto with the BBC Symphony Orchestra and Sakari Oramo. His recording of the work with the BBC Philharmonic was released on 3 October on Ondine.