London Philharmonic Orchestra

Words fail to reflect the scale, beauty and mystery of space and the place of our planet. But music, as Marin Alsop suggests in the tantalising promise of this concert, does rather better. Brett Dean is one of a handful of composers to have written short orchestral asteroids to add to Gustav Holst’s bold and bustling Planets. Komarov’s Fall continues Dean’s fascination with the death of a Soviet cosmonaut in panicked human circumstances. John Adams’ urgent, engaging music for his recent opera, about the testing of the atomic bomb, is heard here in symphonic form, in which a lone trumpet plaintively yet angrily intones the work’s poignant monologue Batter my heart.

There will be a free pre-concert event from 6pm to 6.45pm at the Royal Festival Hall. A performance by Lambeth and Soutwark school children marking the culmination of their composition project, inspired by this evening's repertoire.

Hear it first - visit www.lpo.org.uk/listen for our online playlist of the music for our concerts.