Concerts with works by

Pierre Boulez

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.

BOULEZ ENSEMBLE & MATTHIAS PINTSCHER

A few days before Pierre Boulez’s 100th birthday, Matthias Pintscher and the Boulez Ensemble celebrate the composer, who passed away in 2016, with a perfor­ mance of sur Incises, his last major ensemble work. The program also includes Debussy’s Sonata for Flute, Viola, and Harp as well as Pintscher’s own beyond II (bridge over troubled water). Scored for the same combina­ tion of three instruments, it received its premiere as part of the digital Festival of New Music in the summer of 2020 and is now heard live at the Pierre Boulez Saal for the first time.

Polyphonie X

Composed by Pierre Boulez at age 26, Polyphonie X caused a riot when it premiered at the Donaueschingen Festival in 1951, deemed radical and later withdrawn by the composer. Today, we rediscover the visionary dimension of this little-known score.

Rituel

Benjamin Millepied and his company L.A. Dance Project combine the classicism of ballet with contemporary dance to celebrate a “ritual” with the orchestra based on three seminal scores of musical modernity. Benjamin Millepied's choreography for Rituel is commissioned by Orchestre de Paris - Philharmonie, Los Angeles Philharmonic and New York Philharmonic.

Rituel

Benjamin Millepied and his company L.A. Dance Project combine the classicism of ballet with contemporary dance to celebrate a “ritual” with the orchestra based on three seminal scores of musical modernity. Benjamin Millepied's choreography for Rituel is commissioned by Orchestre de Paris - Philharmonie, Los Angeles Philharmonic and New York Philharmonic.

Anniversaire Boulez | 100

In honour of the centenary of Boulez’s birth, Ensemble Intercontemporain and Les Métaboles revisit cummings ist der dichter and sur Incises, two masterpieces emblematic of his sources of inspiration and compositional process.

Pierre-Laurent Aimard & Tamara Stefanovich

Total Immersion: Pierre Boulez - The Second Piano Sonata

Boulez’s shattering Second Piano Sonata, and two extraordinary works for solo clarinet, performed by the talented musicians of the Guildhall School and introduced by BBC Radio 3’s Kate Molleson.

Total Immersion: Pierre Boulez - The Second Piano Sonata

Boulez’s shattering Second Piano Sonata, and two extraordinary works for solo clarinet, performed by the talented musicians of the Guildhall School and introduced by BBC Radio 3’s Kate Molleson.

Total Immersion: Pierre Boulez - Pli selon pli

An evening-long tribute to the limitless creative mind of Pierre Boulez, culminating in a rare performance of his five-movement epic masterpiece Pli selon Pli.

Total Immersion: Pierre Boulez - Pli selon pli

An evening-long tribute to the limitless creative mind of Pierre Boulez, culminating in a rare performance of his five-movement epic masterpiece Pli selon Pli.

Wie frei ist die Kunst?

The Ensemble Modern's concert series "How Free is Art?" explores artistic freedom and its limits through music and discussions. Philharmonie director Louwrens Langevoort and Museum Ludwig director Yilmaz Dziewior discuss how organizers can meet audience expectations, programming freedoms, and external influences. The concert features avant-garde music (Pierre Boulez), minimalist music (John Adams), and Jennifer Walshe's "Unbreakable line. Hinged waist".

Rising Stars: Carlos Ferreira & Pedro Emanuel Pereira

Clarinetist Carlos Ferreira, winner of the 2021 Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festival's soloist prize and principal clarinetist of the Orchestre National de France, showcases his passion for chamber music. He explores romantic works by Brahms and Schumann, 20th-century pieces by Poulenc and Boulez, and performs the soulful "Duas Igrejas" by Portuguese composer Pedro Emanuel Pereira, demonstrating the clarinet's heartfelt singing capabilities. Ferreira is a Rising Star nominated by Casa da Música Porto, Fundação Gulbenkian Lisbon, and The Sage Gateshead.

Guest performance

Gewandhausorchester, Petr Popelka Dirigent

Pierre Boulez, the 20th-century music master, was never a Gewandhaus guest. Only his "Notations" has been performed there. Born 100 years ago, Boulez studied in Paris and quickly rose to fame. In the 1950s, he became known for enigmatic compositions and, in the 60s, as a conductor. "Éclat," a key work, combines 15 instruments. Boulez also made history as a conductor, shaping interpretations of Debussy, Ravel, Stravinsky, and Bartók. He founded the Ensemble InterContemporain, with Pierre-Laurent Aimard on piano.

Gewandhausorchester, Petr Popelka Dirigent

Pierre Boulez, the 20th-century music master, was never a Gewandhaus guest. Only his "Notations" has been performed there. Born 100 years ago, Boulez studied in Paris and quickly rose to fame. In the 1950s, he became known for enigmatic compositions and, in the 60s, as a conductor. "Éclat," a key work, combines 15 instruments. Boulez also made history as a conductor, shaping interpretations of Debussy, Ravel, Stravinsky, and Bartók. He founded the Ensemble InterContemporain, with Pierre-Laurent Aimard on piano.

ensemble unitedberlin, Vladimir Jurowski

“Music is a labyrinth without beginning and without end, full of new paths to be discovered, where the mystery remains eternal.” This concert is dedicated to the composer and sound thinker Pierre Boulez, who would have celebrated his 100th birthday in 2025. And it is dedicated to “Dérive”, a cultural technique that is emblematic of Pierre Boulez's fascinating way of thinking in sound. The technique, defined by the writer Guy Debord, describes a way of wandering around a place in order to discover it. In the two works Dérive I and Dérive II, Boulez explored the many possible derivations of a hexachord by Paul Sacher. The six notes of this chord haunted Boulez for many years.

Hamburg Philharmonic State Orchestra / Kent Nagano

Pierre Boulez’s »Répons« was one of the remarkable highlights of Kent Nagano’s »Philharmonische Akademie« at St. Michaelis at the beginning of his tenure as General Music Director in Hamburg. He staged the »interchange« between chamber ensemble and soloists to great effect, as well as between electronically altered and unaltered sounds, within the sacred walls of Hamburg’s »Michel« church. The major construction project for the »Elbphilharmonie« was still underway at the time. Ten years later, Nagano revisits this exceptional work by the composer, conductor and founder of the IRCAM Institute in Paris, bringing it to the new and yet already firmly established concert hall on Hamburg’s River Elbe.

Hamburg Philharmonic State Orchestra / Kent Nagano

Pierre Boulez’s »Répons« was one of the remarkable highlights of Kent Nagano’s »Philharmonische Akademie« at St. Michaelis at the beginning of his tenure as General Music Director in Hamburg. He staged the »interchange« between chamber ensemble and soloists to great effect, as well as between electronically altered and unaltered sounds, within the sacred walls of Hamburg’s »Michel« church. The major construction project for the »Elbphilharmonie« was still underway at the time. Ten years later, Nagano revisits this exceptional work by the composer, conductor and founder of the IRCAM Institute in Paris, bringing it to the new and yet already firmly established concert hall on Hamburg’s River Elbe.

Stefanovich & SDLW

It’s about logic, thematic work and the highest artistic demands: the sonata is to the solo instrument what the symphony is to the orchestra and the string quartet to chamber music – the king among genres. »And this is precisely what interests me,« declares star pianist Tamara Stefanovich. »Why do we take this one form for centuries and redress it time and again?« In her concert in the Elbphilharmonie Recital Hall, she contrasts two piano sonatas from the 20th century by Dmitri Shostakovich and Pierre Boulez before she rounds off the evening by improvising together with her jazz ensemble SDLW – an exciting piece of bridge building between form and freedom. Shostakovich’s former piano teacher described his first piano sonata as a »sonata for metronome to the accompaniment of piano«. Experimental, harsh and dissonant, this virtuoso work conveys a feeling of constant movement and, at the same time, grapples with the Russian and western avant-garde. It was a showpiece of the then 20 year old, who repeatedly played it in concert himself. Pierre Boulez’s Second Piano Sonata also fits the »Future« theme of the Hamburg International Music Festival: it is not only extremely demanding, but also includes aleatory elements – composing by chance. Boulez thereby forever departs from the traditional form because, after this work, he was never again to refer back to musical forms of the past in his compositions.

Lichtbogen

This year's central artistic portrait is dedicated to the internationally acclaimed composer Kaija Saariaho. Her main work, "Lichtbogen" (1985-86), utilizes instrumentation and electronics, creating effects from shimmer to laser beams. The festival also honors Pierre Boulez's 100th birthday with a performance of his rare "sur Incises."

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.

Vienna Philharmonic / Igor Levit / Thomas Adès

The Vienna Philharmonic, pianist Igor Levit and conductor Thomas Adès: each of these names alone promises world class artistry. What kind of concert will be the outcome when the three performers join forces? The Austrian Standard wrote of the orchestra’s last concert with Levit that »they were not only on the same wavelength, they were literally surfing on a wave of energy«. For the Hamburg International Music Festival, they have put together a programme full of (positive!) surprises that is well off the beaten track. The classical prelude is a symphony by Joseph Haydn, followed by Thomas Adès’ piano concerto, which has already been performed around 60 times since its premiere in 2019 – a remarkable amount for a contemporary work. Given the fame that the multi-talented British composer enjoys, this success is hardly surprising. A New York Times critic wrote about the premiere of the concerto: »As ever, the craft is astounding, the orchestration ceaselessly brilliant. The voice is wholly his own — dissonant, offbeat, whiplash, wry — even as it whispers to musics past. This breathless concerto comes across as zesty and accessible. But don’t be fooled. Just below the surface, the music sizzles. I can’t wait to hear it again.« Adès, whose music is full of musical echoes from baroque to jazz yet refuses to follow any dogmas, sets the tone for the second half of the concert featuring Leoš Janácek, whose musical language around a century ago was equally undogmatic. His rhapsody »Taras Bulba« sets Nikolai Gogol’s tragic tale of the same name about a father and his two sons to music. So vividly that a film inevitably unfolds in the mind’s eye of the listener. By way of a prelude, two miniatures pay tribute to Pierre Boulez as the spotlighted composer of the International Music Festival.

7th Soirée

Concert in Budapest

Cassie Kinoshi x Ensemble intercontemporain

Spearheaded by France’s flagship contemporary music group, the new, the nearly new, and a 20th century classic are stitched into a programme that explores slavery and the Caribbean experience.

Sir Simon Rattle

Francis Poulenc’s cantata for double mixed choir Figure humaine creates an immense impression: the piece, which transforms poems by surrealist poet Paul Éluard into sound, rapturously culminates in a chord spanning over four octaves that requires the sopranos to sing a high E – an outcry serving as the overwhelming conclusion to this choral masterpiece, which is one of Sir Simon Rattle’s favorite works. With Maurice Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloé (of which, regrettably, only the second suite is often performed), the BRSO chief conductor continues his musical journey through the Ballets Russes following Falla’s The Three-Cornered Hat. Rattle will also conduct Rituel in memoriam Bruno Maderna in honor of Pierre Boulez’s 100th birthday which falls this year: “My teacher, mentor, and friend, whom I miss dearly.”

Sir Simon Rattle

Francis Poulenc’s cantata for double mixed choir Figure humaine creates an immense impression: the piece, which transforms poems by surrealist poet Paul Éluard into sound, rapturously culminates in a chord spanning over four octaves that requires the sopranos to sing a high E – an outcry serving as the overwhelming conclusion to this choral masterpiece, which is one of Sir Simon Rattle’s favorite works. With Maurice Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloé (of which, regrettably, only the second suite is often performed), the BRSO chief conductor continues his musical journey through the Ballets Russes following Falla’s The Three-Cornered Hat. Rattle will also conduct Rituel in memoriam Bruno Maderna in honor of Pierre Boulez’s 100th birthday which falls this year: “My teacher, mentor, and friend, whom I miss dearly.”

Boulez: Le marteau sans maître

Pierre Boulez catapulted himself to the forefront of music pioneers in 1955 with his chamber cantata »Le marteau sans maître« (The Hammer Without a Master). Top young talents such as Ema Nikolovska and Sean Shibe, both Elbphilharmonie FAST LANE artists, juxtapose the Boulez with works by the next generation as part of the Hamburg International Music Festival with the motto »Future«: a brand new piece by drummer and Pulitzer Prize winner Tyshawn Sorey (also featured in the Elbphilharmonie’s »Jazz Drums« focus) and »Bel Canto« by Cassandra Miller, which is dedicated to the opera diva Maria Callas. »Le marteau sans maître« is one of Boulez’s most renowned signature works. He took three surrealist poems by the Frenchman René Char from his eponymous collection as the starting point for this composition for alto voice and six instruments. This is not a traditional setting of text to music though. While the verses are sung, they are also interpreted purely instrumentally – resulting in an almost labyrinthine realm of words and sounds that invite the listener in to search and discover.