Concerts with works by

Anton Webern

Linie 2: 100 Jahre Pierre Boulez

A concert workshop in Freiburg's E-Werk will feature conductor Oscar Jockel explaining Pierre Boulez's "Polyphonie X" with the SWR Symphony Orchestra. This piece, a scandal at its 1951 premiere, connects Boulez's early and later styles. Following the analysis and full performance, the concert includes Webern's arrangement of Bach's "Fuga Ricerata" and Webern's Symphony Op. 21, highlighting polyphony and musical development, both crucial to Boulez's work. A second performance of "Polyphonie X" concludes the evening.

Linie 2: 100 Jahre Pierre Boulez

At the start of the Boulez Year, the Wizemann in Stuttgart will host a unique concert workshop. Conductor Oscar Jockel will introduce Boulez's "Polyphonie X," explaining it with excerpts played by the SWR Symphony Orchestra. This piece, a bridge between Boulez's early and later styles, caused a scandal at its 1951 premiere. The concert also includes Webern's arrangement of Bach's "Fuga Ricerata" and Webern's Symphony Op. 21, both relevant to Boulez's work, and concludes with a second performance of "Polyphonie X."

Watch This Space | Kirill Gerstein & HK Gruber

The Austrian composer, conductor, and singer HK Gruber and the Russian-American pianist Kirill Gerstein combine their wonderfully free-spirited forces for a program that harks back to Berlin in the 1920s, when the First World War was over, the lights were dim, and cabaret was all the rage. Gruber (who, incidentally, is a descendant of Franz Xaver Gruber, the composer of Silent Night) is undisputedly one of the greatest living interpreters of this style. His artistic role models are Kurt Weill and Hanns Eisler, whom he credits for making his career as a composer possible. As for Gerstein, he illuminates Bertolt Brecht’s infectious melodies and sometimes caustic texts with his lively, dance-like piano playing.

THOMAS HAMPSON & WOLFRAM RIEGER

“No other composer has had a more profound influence on me and taught me more than Gustav Mahler,” says Thomas Hampson. Having won universal acclaim for his performances of Mahler’s songs, the baritone has also immersed himself in the composer’s life more thoroughly than almost any other singer. Joined by his longtime piano partner Wolfram Rieger, he takes the audience on a musical journey to Mahler’s eventful times that also includes works by his contemporaries Alban Berg, Arnold Schoenberg, Alexander Zemlinsky, Anton Webern, and Richard Strauss, as well as his personal companion and wife Alma Mahler.

Chamber Music Concert

Vision String Quartet, photo: Harald Hoffmann Accustomed to the most canonical output by avant-garde composers, we sometimes react with amazement to their youthful works, which often attest to their perfect mastery of the principles of composition with which they were about to dramatically break. Such is undoubtedly the case with Langsamer Satz, a work without opus number for string quartet by Anton Webern. According to the critics, this lyrically atmospheric work, in the spirit of late romanticism, conveys the mood of the mountain trek on which the composer supposedly fell in love with his cousin and future wife, Wilhelmina Mörtl. Enchanted by the aura of Paris, Grażyna Bacewicz returned from her second stay in the French capital having composed there her String Quartet No. 3. This work is characterised by passionate vitality and a wealth of development techniques in the outer movements and a bold departure from the tonal path in the slow movement. Before Johannes Brahms considered any of his string quartets suitable for public consumption, he apparently destroyed some 20 youthful essays in the genre. His admiration for Ludwig van Beethoven’s quartets bordered on a paralysing creative phobia. The Quartet in C minor from Op. 51, sent to his publisher after years of work and revision, turned out to be one of the most groundbreaking works in his oeuvre. Even if it does contain discernible elements of the Beethovenian spirit, Brahms managed to keep a rein on them.

Festival Élite 2025 – Quatuor Moser

JACK QUARTET

Pierre Boulez’s Livre pour quatuor is among the most complex chamber music works of the 20th century. At the same time, the score—left unfinished by the composer—also has a fragmentary quality. The JACK Quartet, regularly heard at the Pierre Boulez Saal over the last few seasons, performs individual movements from Boulez’s only string quartet, pairing them with recent works by Eva­-Maria Houben and Anthony Cheung, among others, and the String Quartet in Four Parts by Boulez’s contemporary John Cage.

Yunchan Lim

At just 20 years of age, and already winner of the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, South Korean pianist Yunchan Lim embodies the new generation of pianists, and creates subtle resonances between repertoires, movements and composers.

Isabelle Faust and Alexander Melnikov: Brahms and Schumann

For lovers of chamber music the Recital Hall is the venue of choice. You can hear the musicians breathe and you can practically touch them. This hall is also cherished by musicians for its beautiful acoustics and direct contact with the audience. In the Recital Hall you can hear the best musicians of our time. Buy your tickets now and experience the magic of the Recital Hall for yourself!

NDR Bigband / Ensemble Modern / Jonathan Stockhammer / Geir Lysne

Frank Zappa had a special position in the popular music of the 20th century because he was inspired and influenced by composers of the contemporary avant-garde. Colin Towns has arranged some of Zappa’s compositions for the NDR Bigband. Under the direction of chief conductor Geir Lysne, the big band presents a programme of these pieces. Musicians from Ensemble Modern, Zappa’s »last band«, will round off the evening under the direction of Jonathan Stockhammer with works that characterised Zappa: Iannis Xenakis’ »Anaktoria«, Anton Webern’s Symphony op. 21, »Octandre« by Edgard Varèse and Karlheinz Stockhausen’s »Gesang der Jünglinge«.

Sonderkonzert am 65. Geburtstag von Steffen Schleiermacher

Mendels­sohn Violin­konzert

The Essen Philharmonic's tenth symphony concert features Weber's "Sommerwind", a nature-inspired composition based on a poem by Bruno Wille. Zemlinsky's "Seejungfrau" surprises with its narrative power and poetic mood. The program also includes Mendelssohn's famous Violin Concerto, one of the most frequently performed works of its kind.

Mendels­sohn Violin­konzert

The Essen Philharmonic's tenth symphony concert features Weber's "Sommerwind", a nature-inspired composition based on a poem by Bruno Wille. Zemlinsky's "Seejungfrau" surprises with its narrative power and poetic mood. The program also includes Mendelssohn's famous Violin Concerto, one of the most frequently performed works of its kind.

Mahler Festival: Chianti Ensemble with Mahler and more

In the Recital Hall this week, you will hear the 'other side' of Mahler: works for just a few musicians. In two Sunday Morning Concerts, these come together with those of Mahler's contemporaries and friends. Today, the Chianti Ensemble performs, among others, the Piano Quartet, Mahler's only remaining chamber work.Mahler wrote his Piano Quartet as a teenager. Certainly for Mahler's standards, it is very romantic, Schumannesque - and unfinished. A first movement is complete, but only a few bars of the scherzo exist. The piece was recovered by his widow Alma Mahler in the 1960s. The Chianti Ensemble, operating from the Netherlands, consists of five internationally sought-after soloists, and today performs Mahler's quartet alongside pieces by Webern and Dvořák.

Simone Young

Simone Young

Mahler Festival: Song recital Alma Mahler and friends

For four days, the Recital Hall is dedicated to Mahler's most beautiful songs. A special recital is dedicated to his wife Alma, combining pieces by her with those by friends. Perhaps today's most important Lieder accompanist, pianist Julius Drake, flanks his favourite vocalists during all these concerts. Today you will hear French soprano Axelle Fanyo, a 'true storyteller' according to Forum Opéra. She shares the stage with one of the greatest Dutch talents, baritone Raoul Steffani.Austrian Alma Maria Schindler was introduced to her future husband, Gustav Mahler, by her composition teacher Zemlinsky. Under Mahler's name, she would become known - but never primarily as a composer. Mahler did not want his wife to write any more music, and Alma herself also had doubts about her work. Although most of it has been lost, her late-romantic, often melancholic songs are still widely performed. Here today in the Recital Hall, they alternate with pieces by friends and acquaintances. Axelle Fanyo and Raoul Steffani perform songs by Ernst Krenek, Mahler's son-in-law. You will also hear works by Berg, Korngold and Stravinsky.

Quatuour Diotima

Performed by one of its outstanding interpreters, Boulez’s uncompromising Livre pour quatuor is at the heart of a centenary tribute to the composer referencing Webern, Bach, and impassioned Debussy.

Guest performance

Viotti, Gabetta · Saint-Saëns, Rimsky-Korsakov