Keywords: Subscription Concert, Symphony Concert, Vocal Music
| Manfred Honeck | Conductor |
| Julia Bullock | Soprano |
| Bavarian Radio Chorus | |
| Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks |
| Julian Anderson | “Exiles. Remembrances” for voices and orchestra |
| Dmitri Shostakovich | Symphony No. 5 in D Minor, Op. 47 |
These events are similar in terms of concept, place, musicians or the program.
Paul Lewis and the BRSO had actually planned to make up for Edvard Grieg’s Piano Concerto in these concerts, which was canceled due to the pandemic. Due to a vertebral injury, the British pianist is now playing Beethoven’s Fourth Piano Concerto – instead of the young Norwegian’s unabashedly romantic piece, a work that opens the door to the Romantic era. And it would be hard to find a better interpreter than the proven Beethoven specialist Paul Lewis. In conductor Manfred Honeck’s conception, Schulhoff’s Five Pieces for String Quartet will be brought to life with a more expressive, or, to be precise, more Dadaist character: rhythmically concise, ecstatically pulsating – a playful new territory for the BRSO musicians. And, indeed, every concert that includes the Eroica is bound to be one of the highlights of an orchestral season.
Paul Lewis and the BRSO had actually planned to make up for Edvard Grieg’s Piano Concerto in these concerts, which was canceled due to the pandemic. Due to a vertebral injury, the British pianist is now playing Beethoven’s Fourth Piano Concerto – instead of the young Norwegian’s unabashedly romantic piece, a work that opens the door to the Romantic era. And it would be hard to find a better interpreter than the proven Beethoven specialist Paul Lewis. In conductor Manfred Honeck’s conception, Schulhoff’s Five Pieces for String Quartet will be brought to life with a more expressive, or, to be precise, more Dadaist character: rhythmically concise, ecstatically pulsating – a playful new territory for the BRSO musicians. And, indeed, every concert that includes the Eroica is bound to be one of the highlights of an orchestral season.
Beethoven’s only violin concerto is one of the best-known works of its genre and the most significant concerto in the violin repertoire altogether. Time and again artists undertake new interpretative approaches to this masterpiece. One such artist is the Munich violinist Julia Fischer, the winner of many coveted prizes, including the Beethoven Ring. The last time she stood on the Gasteig concert stage with the BRSO was in 2009, when she played Prokofiev’s First Concerto under Mariss Jansons. Besides Beethoven, the American conductor-composer Michael Tilson Thomas will also conduct Aaron Copland’s Third Symphony. Leonard Bernstein, who gave the work its European première, maintained that “the symphony has become an American monument, like the Washington Monument or the Lincoln Memorial”, and called it “the greatest American symphony ever written”.
Beethoven’s only violin concerto is one of the best-known works of its genre and the most significant concerto in the violin repertoire altogether. Time and again artists undertake new interpretative approaches to this masterpiece. One such artist is the Munich violinist Julia Fischer, the winner of many coveted prizes, including the Beethoven Ring. The last time she stood on the Gasteig concert stage with the BRSO was in 2009, when she played Prokofiev’s First Concerto under Mariss Jansons. Besides Beethoven, the American conductor-composer Michael Tilson Thomas will also conduct Aaron Copland’s Third Symphony. Leonard Bernstein, who gave the work its European première, maintained that “the symphony has become an American monument, like the Washington Monument or the Lincoln Memorial”, and called it “the greatest American symphony ever written”.
»Scena di Berenice«, which is rarely performed nowadays, was composed by Joseph Haydn during his second visit to London. The content is quintessential for a classical aria: a woman in love has been abandoned by her partner and now laments sonorously. 130 years later, a work by Béla Bartók caused a far-reaching scandal: the fiery dance pantomime called »The Miraculous Mandarin« was banned in Cologne in 1926 by the then Lord Mayor Konrad Adenauer. This is how barbaric the music seemed to the listeners. And it is indeed true: Bartók was not interested in music as edification. He wanted to depict reality. And reality in the early 20th century was often a long way from harmonious. In the second half of the concert, Gustav Mahler’s fourth and arguably most light-filled symphony takes us back to the beginning of the century. But beware: the light in the symphony is tempered with some dark shallow waters. At a children’s concert at New York’s Carnegie Hall back in 1960, the great rediscoverer of Mahler, Leonard Bernstein, said: »Well, you might not believe it, but the man who wrote all that jolly stuff was one of the most unhappy people in history!«
»Scena di Berenice«, which is rarely performed nowadays, was composed by Joseph Haydn during his second visit to London. The content is quintessential for a classical aria: a woman in love has been abandoned by her partner and now laments sonorously. 130 years later, a work by Béla Bartók caused a far-reaching scandal: the fiery dance pantomime called »The Miraculous Mandarin« was banned in Cologne in 1926 by the then Lord Mayor Konrad Adenauer. This is how barbaric the music seemed to the listeners. And it is indeed true: Bartók was not interested in music as edification. He wanted to depict reality. And reality in the early 20th century was often a long way from harmonious. In the second half of the concert, Gustav Mahler’s fourth and arguably most light-filled symphony takes us back to the beginning of the century. But beware: the light in the symphony is tempered with some dark shallow waters. At a children’s concert at New York’s Carnegie Hall back in 1960, the great rediscoverer of Mahler, Leonard Bernstein, said: »Well, you might not believe it, but the man who wrote all that jolly stuff was one of the most unhappy people in history!«
For most of the 19th century, the French romanticism was seeking a way of its own, trying not to fall within the orbit of German influence – César Franck, however, eventually preferred to yield to the inspiration to be found in those, simultaneously finding a voice of his own in the Symphony in D minor. It was, of course, characterised by a high density of harmony, but also by refined and gripping themes, as well as a specific melancholy and an unusual multiplicity of timbres in a sonically opulent orchestra. Thus, he created a work perceived as one of the most excellent symphonies of the century.Gabriel Fauré belongs to the next generation already, one turning towards the French clarity. This is not yet impressionism, but it is already a music shining with its inner brilliance, esoteric and ethereal, and at the same time infinitely subtle and elegant. There is also a gentle glow, that of the soft and warm autumn sun, to be found in his Requiem, exceptional in the whole history of music. This mass for the dead originated as a mass indeed: for the liturgies in the church that Fauré played the organ and gave concerts in. The terror of death turns into what is more like nostalgic reflection, looking into the netherworld with bright eyes, not expecting any shock whatsoever.Jakub PuchalskiConcert duration: approximately 100 minutes
Although Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart would compose music in virtually all the genres popular in his lifetime, it was opera that he was most enthusiastic about. The concert will begin with Chaconne and Pas seul – ballet fragments from the opera seria (i.e. a serious one) Idomeneus, King of Crete, emanating pomp and circumstance, commissioned by the Munich opera theatre. Then, Ilse Eerens will perform three fragments from another one of Mozart’s works for theatre. The recitative Crudele! and the subsequent dramatic-lyrical aria Non mi dir belong to Donna Anna’s part in Don Giovanni, a work its composer curiously dubbed „a joyous drama”. Further, we are going to hear the good-humoured recitative Giuns’alfin il momento and the lyrical aria Deh vieni non tardar, which maintains its mood. Both come from the fourth act of the opera buffa The Marriage of Figaro, in which they are sung by Susanna during the night-time garden scene. The final link in Eerens’ performance will be the aria Fra l’oscure ombre funeste, from the Old Testament-inspired cantata Davide penitente – solemn in its mood, to the extent of seeming ceremonious. The concert will be crowned with a performance of a work that constitutes the embodiment of the classical style, namely the Symphony in D major, also known as the Haffner Symphony. The symphony’s subtitle is the surname of a Salzburg family the composer was friends with, the occasion for its commission being the ennoblement of Sigmund Haffner. In his letters, Mozart emphasised that the first movement is fiery, while the finale ought to be played “as fast as possible!”Oskar ŁapetaConcert duration: approximately 70 minutes
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