Norway's venerable Trondheim Symphony Orchestra (TSO) is touring China for the first time in its 101-year history, with its opening show this Friday at 7:30 pm at the Beijing Century Theater. The program includes Edvard Grieg's Peer Gynt Suite, Felix Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto in E minor and Antonin Dvorak's beloved Symphony No. 9, "From the New World." Read on to find out how you can win a pair of tickets to this concert.

Chief conductor and TSO artistic director Eivind Aadland first set foot in Beijing in the early-90s, when he led the European Union Chamber Orchestra in a historic performance inside the Great Hall of the People. This time, he arrives to a radically changed musical landscape, as Western classical music has made significant inroads into the country in recent years. "I think you have a terrific future in this field," Aadland says. "I've studied with wonderful Chinese musicians and I've seen a lot of fantastic talent coming out of this country, so I think the future for Western classical music in China is very big."

The China tour, which concludes on May 28 in Shanghai, will be Aadland's final tour as TSO's music director. After seven years, it's been long enough, he says. "This is my saying goodbye to the orchestra. I've had a wonderful time with them."

Did you understand the momentousness of the Great Hall of the People concert?
Aadland: We were early visitors to China. The hall being so big, the audience was big, and it was a very warm audience. The things surrounding it made it one concert that I really remember.

You've chosen Grieg, Mendelssohn and Dvorak for the program Friday. Why these three?
It's a combination of reasons. First of all, Grieg, the opening piece, is very Norwegian. It's very associated with our country - not exactly folk music but very Norwegian in language. He's also our main international composer, so it's obviously natural for us to present him.

Dvorak is a little bit of the Czech or the Slavonic equivalent of Grieg. Romantic. It's a popular symphony, it's a masterpiece, so I think it's a nice connection between Grieg and Dvorak. I've always enjoyed putting them together or seeing them communicating with each other. 

And then the Mendelssohn concerto is earlier, more classically romantic, so it's a little bit lighter. It gives breathing space in the middle of the program, and it's also a wonderful vehicle for a soloist (Henning Kraggerud) to show his virtuosity.

How would you characterize Norwegian music?
Part of Norwegian music is closely connected to the old folk music of a country, and Grieg was one of the first to take the music from the peasants and transform it to the concert scene. But I think there is something in the north, in Scandinavia, in Norway, maybe a melancholic voice... the northern melancholy mood I think is recognizable.

Do you think this kind of music will resonate with Chinese audiences?
I think so. Because although Grieg and Dvorak have local roots, their musical language is really universal, no doubt about it. On can be rooted in one place and speak an international language -- they go very well together.

What do you think they're trying to say?
They're such rich pieces, sentimental, melancholic... how can I say, fanfare-like, with happiness, joy. It's a really very rich, emotional spectrum. And Dvorak is everything from sadness to playfulness to pure joy. It's one of the reasons (his ninth symphony) has become a main classical work, it's so rich in expression. [You can listen to a recording of it from the Columbia University Orchestra.]

It's been said that when you're conducting, your whole body becomes part of the performance. What's it like to stand on the conductor's podium?
In the best moments, I forget that I'm standing there. That's the best moments of conducting, when I'm so involved with the music that I don't judge exactly where my hands are going. It's kind of losing oneself and yet somewhere you have to have control. But this combination of trying to let go and be one with music and not think about myself as a conductor, that's what I'm trying to do.

The Trondheim Symphony Orchestra plays this Friday at 7:30 pm at Beijing Century Theater, No. 40, Liangmaqiao Lu, Chaoyang. Tickets are available through Wu Promotion (RMB 100-580).

We have a double pass to the Trondheim Symphony Orchestra performance this Friday (May 21), for the first reader to answer this question: In which venue was conductor Eivind Aadland's first appearance in China in the early 1990s?

Send your answer to: danedwards@truerun.com