Ratkje, Dvořák, and Prokofiev
Ratkje, Dvořák, and Prokofiev

Maja Ratkje: (How) To play the Ocean, new work in Essensen av Stavanger – world premiere and commissioned work
Sergei Prokofiev: Sinfonia Concertante
Antonín Dvořák: Symphony No. 5
Maja Ratkje, composer
Andris Poga, conductor
Edgar Moreau, cello
Adrian Iliescu, concertmaster
Maja S. K. Ratkje is one of Norway’s most distinctive composers and performers, known for her exploration of the voice as an instrument and for challenging the boundaries between composition and improvisation. She has collaborated with orchestras across Europe, and several of her large-scale works have received international recognition. Among these are Waves IIb, awarded the Edvard Prize and acknowledged by UNESCO, and Considering Icarus, a trombone concerto that has been taken up by multiple orchestras. Ratkje’s music is marked by intuitive expression, complex formal structures, and a unique approach to timbre and texture.
Environmental and societal issues are central to Ratkje’s artistic practice. She has created works that address the human impact on nature, including A Whisper, or a Prayer, or a Song, performed as part of a series focused on Nordic ecosystems. Her concern for the ocean and its vulnerability is also reflected in recent orchestral works, where acoustic and electronic elements combine to give voice to ecological and existential themes. Ratkje is a member of the Akademie der Künste in Berlin and has received numerous awards for her work, including the Arne Nordheim Prize and the Liv Ullmann Prize.
Andris Poga is the Chief Conductor of the Stavanger Symphony Orchestra. He was the Music Director of the Latvian National Symphony Orchestra from 2013 till 2021 and continues to collaborate with the LNSO as its Artistic Advisor.
Highlights of recent years have included concerts with the leading orchestras of Germany, France, Italy, Japan and Scandinavia. After the first successful collaborations he has become a regular guest at the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester Hamburg, WDR Sinfonieorchester Cologne, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, NHK Symphony Orchestra Tokyo and many others. He has also conducted the Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich, Gewandhausorchester, Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Hong Kong Philharmonic, Sydney Symphony, Dallas Symphony.
The season of 2024/25 includes the subscription concert series with both the SSO and LNSO, returns to the Orchestre National de France, WDR Sinfonieorchester, NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester, Konzerthausorchester Berlin, Hamburg Symphoniker among others. Andris will make his debuts with the Iceland Symphony, Turku Philharmonic, Düsseldorf Symphony and other orchestras in Europe and Japan. The notable soloists will include instrumentalists Frank Peter Zimmermann, David Fray, Jan Lisiecki, Jean-Guihen Queyras and singers Julia Bullock, Miina-Liisa Värelä, Alfred Walker.
In 2010, Andris Poga was the First Prize winner of the Evgeny Svetlanov International Conducting Competition, which thrust him into the international scene. He became an assistant to Paavo Järvi at the Orchestre de Paris and he also served as the assistant conductor for the Boston Symphony Orchestra.
Andris has graduated the conducting department of the Jāzeps Vītols Latvian Academy of Music. He studied philosophy at the University of Latvia and conducting at the Vienna University of Music and Performing Arts.
Edgar Moreau (b. 1994) began cello at age four and debuted with Teatro Regio Orchestra in Torino at eleven, performing Dvořák’s Cello Concerto. He won top prizes at the 2009 Rostropovich Competition, the 2011 Tchaikovsky Competition, and the 2014 Young Concert Artist Award. He regularly appears with leading orchestras such as the Wiener Symphoniker, the Philadelphia Orchestra (one of America’s esteemed “Big Five”), Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and Orchestre National de France. He has collaborated with distinguished conductors including Nathalie Stutzmann, Andrés Orozco-Estrada and Pascal Rophé.
Moreaus discography includes Play (with Pierre-Yves Hodique), the ECHO Klassik-winning Giovincello (with Il Pomo d’Oro & Riccardo Minasi), and Rococo (Warner Classics, 2024) featuring Tchaikovsky’s Rococo Variations with Luzerner Sinfonieorchester under Michael Sanderling and Chopin’s Cello Sonata with David Kadouch. He has received accolades such as the Victoires de la Musique Classique, ECHO Rising Star, and prizes from Fondation Banque Populaire and Adami. Since 2023, he serves as Cello Professor at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris. He performs on a 1711 David Tecchler cello with a bow by Dominique Peccatte.