Watch Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony Ode To Joy on BigPond. This is a sold out performance so your only chance to see and hear the Sydney Symphony’s 2012 season opening gala will be here on BigPond.

Metamorphosen is an "ode to sorrow" - one composer's response to the devastation of World War II. Beethoven's Ninth Symphony ends with the "Ode to Joy" - triumphant and optimistic. But, says Vladimir Ashkenazy, both these great musical works relate to the humanity of mankind - "one is pessimistic, the other is gloriously open." 

Richard Strauss gives us weighty, tormented music, tinged with personal suffering. 

Beethoven's Ninth shows a composer who wrestled with fate, who believed in freedom, who was a voice for the world. He still is. And that's why this monumental symphony resonates, nearly two hundred years later. 

R STRAUSS Metamorphosen

BEETHOVEN Symphony No.9 (Choral) 

Vladimir Ashkenazy conductor

Lorina Gore soprano

Sally-Anne Russell mezzo-soprano

James Egglestone tenor

Michael Nagy baritone

Sydney Philharmonia Choirs 

(Symphony Chorus, Chamber Singers and VOX)