Alexander Scriabin wasn’t just a composer—he saw himself as a prophet of a new world, with music as the key to transformation. For him, the senses were everything: only through intense, conscious experience could humanity reach true ecstasy. With each symphony, he pushed the boundaries further. His Fifth — The Poem of Fire — became a heady fusion of sound, mysticism, and colour: a swirling, ritualistic vision of music as pure experience.
“I am a moment illuminating eternity, I am affirmation, I am ecstasy.”– Alexander Scriabin
Le Poème du feu work calls for a large orchestra, women’s choir, piano, and—well ahead of its time—a colour organ to project light in sync with the music. Scriabin never saw that dream fully realised, but he left the door wide open for others to imagine what it could be. Now, at the invitation of the Brussels Philharmonic, Nazanin Fakoor brings that vision to life—not only for The Poem of Fire, but also for Debussy’s shimmering La Mer.
programme
Gustav Mahler
Kindertotenlieder, GMV 45: In diesem Wetter (soloist: Oleg Volkov, bass-baritone)
Johannes Brahms
Double Concerto for Violin, Cello and Orchestra, Op. 102 (soloists: Corina Belcea, violin & Aleksey Shadrin, cello)
--- intermission ---
Claude Debussy
La Mer
Alexander Scriabin Symphony No. 5, Op. 60 “Prométhée - Le Poème du feu”
>> visual concept by Nazanin Fakoor (visual artist) & Gerd Van Looy (artistic coordination)
YOUR CONCERT NIGHT
14:30 guided tour: interieurbezoek Hotel Van Eetvelde (Korei Guided Tours) (combi-tickets)
19:00 doors open
19:30 introduction
20:15 concert
22:15 end
CONCERT INCL. INTERMISSION (120')
with the support of Beside Tax Shelter and the Belgian Tax Shelter
visual concept
Nazanin Fakoor is an Iranian-German multi-disciplinary artist and director based in Brussels. Her visual installations and performances are worlds that the spectator can enter and influence. Through her work, she explores utopian possibilities at the intersection of recognition and alienation, aesthetics and social issues, and reality and possibility, blending video, performance, and installation with light, sound, movement and music.
"Visionary and enigmatic, Scriabin dreamed of a total art form. His Poem of Fire, conceived with colour and light effects, is its most dazzling expression. We offer a contemporary interpretation of this work, true to the composer’s innovative spirit." – Kazushi Ono