Albert Schweitzer Jugendorchester / Frantz / Beckedorf

Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester

Under conductor Ingo Metzmacher, the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester combines microtonal orchestral music with cosmic late Romanticism – and, in Anton Bruckner, Richard Wagner and Luigi Nono, three of the most headstrong characters in musical history.

Nationales Jugendorchester der Niederlande

Felix Mendelssohn Jugendorchester / Clemens Malich

The Felix Mendelssohn Jugendorchester (MJO) ends its 50th anniversary season with this concert and starts into the future with »AufWind«. The evening begins with one of the most famous works by Felix Mendelssohn, who was born in Hamburg 225 years ago. Although the wedding march is not played, the overture to the 17-year-old’s Midsummer Night’s Dream shows the fresh wind with which the young Felix sailed into his musical career. This is followed by perhaps the most famous concerto for flute and orchestra by French composer Jacques Ibert. Written in Paris a good 100 years ago, it is full of esprit and charm. The soloist is Nane Schulz, who has been playing in the orchestra since she was 10 years old. Honoured with many national prizes, she is sure to carry her breath into an outstanding career. This year’s great jubilarian is Anton Bruckner. In his marvellous 4th Symphony, the »Romantic«, the brass players in particular will generate a lot of wind to create the monumental blocks of sound in front of you. Reduced-price tickets cost € 15 and are available to young people under 30, the unemployed, welfare recipients, the severely disabled and pensioners. Wheelchair users and accompanying persons can obtain tickets directly from the organiser. Please contactinfo@theyoungclassx.de or 040 414 334 270.

Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester / Ingo Metzmacher

»You sometimes need to go against the grain a bit in the music business,« says conductor Ingo Metzmacher. With Beethoven, Shostakovich and Schönberg, he includes three composers on the programme who did just that and wrote music that is still moving and inspiring today. And perhaps this is also an important message to the highly talented youngsters in the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester, who bring the three revolutionaries to the stage in a young, fresh and certainly a little rebellious way.

Albert-Schweitzer-Jugendorchester / Mädchenchor Hamburg

A special highlight of the 2024/25 anniversary season to mark the 50th anniversary of the Albert Schweitzer Youth Orchestra is the »ASJ meets girls’ choir« concert. The Hamburg Girls’ Choir, one of Germany’s leading youth choirs, will be a guest at the Elbphilharmonie with the Albert Schweitzer Youth Orchestra. In addition to an a cappella part of the choir, in which choral music from various centuries and genres will be performed, the »Trois Nocturnes« by Claude Debussy for female choir and orchestra will take centre stage. Debussy wrote a letter to the famous violinist Eugène Ysaÿe in September 1894. In it, he mentioned the planned composition of three Nocturnes for violin and orchestra. Debussy announced different orchestration for the individual movements and wanted to achieve variations in tone colour in this way, similar to the way a painter creates a »study in grey«, for example. After he once again hinted in a letter in 1894 that the pieces were finished and that Ysaÿe could perform them, this was not to be the case. The final version, which was completed in 1899, did not include a solo violin at all. The Nocturnes were premièred in Paris in 1900. However, only the first two movements were performed due to the lack of a female choir, which only sings in the third nocturne. This unusual instrumentation alone meant that the »Trois Nocturnes« were often performed incompletely or not at all. On the occasion of the anniversary of the Albert Schweitzer Youth Orchestra, the work »Elegie an die Zeit« for women’s choir and orchestra was composed in autumn 2024 by Ettore Prandi, born in Milan and based in Hamburg. It is an exploration of time, a parameter that is so fundamental to all existence. In this way, an arc is created, from the transience of time in »Der Rosenkavalier« to Gerd Heinze’s poem »Wieviel Uhr«, on which »Elegie an die Zeit« is based. The work is to be understood as a short journey through elegiac, mournful and hopeful thoughts about the passing of time and will be performed for the first time at this concert. In the hit lists of classical music, »The Vltava« by Smetana always occupies one of the top places. Geographically speaking, the sources of the Vltava and Hamburg are connected by this river, which flows into the Elbe between Prague and Dresden. In the programme of the second part of the concert, this route leads from the »Vltava« via a stopover to Dresden. Richard Strauss’ opera »Der Rosenkavalier« was performed there for the very first time in 1911. The two works logically meet at their destination, the Elbphilharmonie. A geographical relationship that leads to a musical unity.

Albert Schweitzer Jugendorchester / Christian Tetzlaff / Sebastian Beckedorf

The Albert Schweitzer Youth Orchestra is celebrating its 50th anniversary with this special concert. It is a great honour for the orchestra to have a real world star as a soloist for this occasion: Christian Tetzlaff, who also played in the Albert Schweitzer Youth Orchestra as a teenager. In the course of his international career, Christian Tetzlaff has performed with all the major orchestras, including the Vienna and New York Philharmonic Orchestras, the Concertgebouworkest in Amsterdam and all the London orchestras. He has worked with legendary maestri such as Sergiu Celibidache, Bernard Haitink, Lorin Maazel, Kurt Masur and Christoph von Dohnányi. Johannes Brahms’ Violin Concerto still occupies an outstanding position in the literature of violin concertos. It was completed in 1878 and dedicated to the famous violinist Joseph Joachim, who assisted Brahms in writing the solo part. The première was a year later in Leipzig under Brahms’ direction and with Joseph Joachim on the violin. Four years before Brahms’ violin concerto, the operetta »Die Fledermaus« was composed in 1874 by Johann Strauss (son). The overture is a brilliant compilation of the most beautiful melodies from the operetta. Cheerful with bubbling energy on the one hand and on the other hand a highly highly demanding work that requires great virtuosity from the orchestra. The opera »Der Rosenkavalier« was premiered in 1911 and is a masterful blend of comedy and romance. Richard Strauss combined all the highlights of the opera into a purely orchestral suite, in which the audience hears, among other things, the prelude to the first act, the presentation of the roses and the touching final tercet from the third act. The tumultuous Viennese waltz with which Baron Ochs leaves the bar is, of course, included.

Landesjugendorchester Hamburg

The Landesjugendorchester Hamburg (LJO Hamburg) is a select orchestra of the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg and has been an integral part of the young music scene for over 55 years. The patron of the ensemble is the First Mayor, Dr Peter Tschentscher. In its summer concert, the LJO Hamburg will perform for the first time with guest conductor Bar Avni.

Bundesjugendorchester / World Youth Choir / Tan Dun

Tan Dun is considered one of the most impressive and influential composers of our time – a crossover artist who combines classical and modern elements in his music and creates a connection between East and West. His work »Choral Concerto: Nine«, inspired by Ludwig van Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 and composed to mark the 250th anniversary of his birth in 2020, now celebrates its German premiere at the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival.

Landesjugendorchester Hamburg

The Landesjugendorchester Hamburg (LJO Hamburg) has been an integral part of the young music scene for over 55 years as the select orchestra of the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg. The patron of the ensemble is the First Mayor, Dr Peter Tschentscher. In its working phases, the symphony orchestra devotes itself to major works of orchestral literature as well as programmes with smaller ensembles or contemporary works. This year’s autumn concert under the direction of Johannes Witt will feature the work »Aufbruch«, composed in 1986 by Detlev Glanert especially for the LJO Hamburg (then still the Hamburg Youth Orchestra). Glanert, who is now in demand all over the world and was himself a member of the youth orchestra at the time, composed the piece practically to fit the orchestra at the time. The Hamburger Abendblatt described the work after the premiere with the words: »Glanert’s stylistically ›forward‹ music is full of eruptive and lyrical ideas, organically developed in context and skilfully orchestrated.« Directly afterwards, the programme features Shostakovich’s 5th Symphony, a blockbuster that the Russian composer composed in 1937 under pressure from the Stalin regime. Shortly beforehand, he had fallen out of favour with his opera Lady Mcbeth of Mtsensk« due to his overly progressive compositional technique and now had to adapt outwardly. Whether grotesque ländler, furiously noisy march or mournful themes – Shostakovich created a parody of the triumphalism of the time, which the audience at the premiere certai»nly recognised, while the party leaders celebrated the return of the prodigal son with this symphony. A fallacy, as can also be seen from the musical quotations used in the symphony. Although Shostakovich was deeply connected to the Russian people and their culture, his progressive ideas under Stalinism meant that he himself always had to fear for his life and that of his family – he subtly expressed his demand for humanity and dignity through his music. The LJO Hamburg is organised by the Landesmusikrat in der Freien und Hansestadt Hamburg e. V. and is funded by the Ministry of Culture and Media.

Landesjugendorchester Bremen / Anaëlle Tourret / Stefan Geiger

The Landesjugendorchester Bremen, conducted by Stefan Geiger, brings together talented young musicians from the Hanseatic city and surrounding area to work on orchestral pieces and perform them across northern Germany. On the agenda for this year’s Easter work period are Dmitri Shostakovich’s Tenth Symphony, and the Harp Concerto by the French composer François Adrien Boieldieu, for which the orchestra is joined by the high-profile soloist Anaëlle Tourret.