Matthias Pintscher

Matthias Pintscher & Cédric Tiberghien

musica viva: Matthias Hermann

A feast of sound for Helmut Lachenmann: The horn section and the BRSO, conducted by Matthias Hermann, will present the world premiere of the final version of My Melodies. The composition opens up an enormous range of performing possibilities and reveals new dimensions of sound, transforming the music to an “object of observation” and the concert hall to a “place of adventure” (Lachenmann). Pierre-Laurent Aimard and Yuko Kakuta will perform Lachenmann’s Got Lost: a highly virtuosic piece in which verses by Friedrich Nietzsche and Fernando Pessoa are juxtaposed with a short note about a lost laundry basket. The three texts are “stripped of their emotive, poetic, mundane diction […], and sent into a constantly changing intervallic field of sound, resonance, and movement” (Lachenmann).

Matthias Pintscher & Xavier de Maistre

The concert will be broadcast on Deutschlandfunk Kultur on 27 February 2024 at 8.03 pm.

Kansas City Symphony / Conrad Tao / Matthias Pintscher

A gentle trill from the clarinet, a lascivious glissando, and one of the most famous pieces for piano and orchestra picks up speed: George Gershwin’s »Rhapsody in Blue«. Presented to the public slightly awkwardly in 1924 as an »experiment in modern music«, it has since become something of a signature tune for the Broadway composer. Catchy jazz and blues melodies together with a casual orchestral sound and a highly virtuoso piano part bring the Roaring Twenties vividly to life. The Kansas City Symphony is celebrating its 100th anniversary under the direction of its new chief conductor Matthias Pintscher together with 30-year-old pianist Conrad Tao, whom the New York Times sees as the »future of classical music«. This highlight of the piano repertoire is framed by two further classics by famous American composers: Charles Ives’s »Three Places in New England« with a marvellously whimsical march in the middle section, and Aaron Copland’s powerful Third Symphony. Welcome to the United States of America!

NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra / NDR Vokalensemble / Matthias Brandt / Jonathan Stockhammer

Luigi Nono always saw himself as a political person and composer. But rather than composing musical manifestos against social injustice, he believed in the power of music to educate and enlighten. As in 1956, when he – in his large-scale cantata »Il canto sospeso« – translated farewell letters by members of the resistance that had been sentenced to death into a stirring and highly poetic tonal language. The German-American conductor and Nono specialist Jonathan Stockhammer now presents this »suspended song« in the Grand Hall. Luigi Nono’s musical credo was to »awaken the ear, the eyes, human thought« with his works. This aspiration is reflected in the »Canto sospeso«, which was premiered in Cologne in 1956 and which – with its orchestra parts, a-cappella chorales and arias – also underlines Nono’s affinity for Italian madrigal and operatic art. Yet in its musical recollection, this »song« exudes a blazing presence.

Symphonischer Chor Hamburg / Neue Philharmonie Hamburg / Matthias Janz

Francis Poulenc had a mischievous streak in his neck. Contemporaries accused him of lacking seriousness in his Gloria – and indeed, movements two and four are quite jokey. He was called a »monk and rascal« because he was also capable of serious inner reflection. He considered his music to be as cheerful and pious as monks playing soccer, which he had once observed. The other movements of the Gloria show other typical characteristics of Francis Poulenc’s music: heroic sound with timpani and trumpets at the beginning, intimate sounds with woodwinds, solo singing and choir in the third movement and a large, softer sound in the finale. Poulenc himself said: »I believe I have brought the best and most credible aspect of myself into my choral music.«

CANCELLED: K&K Philharmoniker / Soloists / Matthias & Max Kendlinger

This event has been cancelled – it will not be rescheduled on an alternative date. Tickets can be returned where they were purchased. When Verdi’s »Patria oppressa« meets Kendlinger’s »Höre Mensch«, musical forces unite for human rights. There is an essential point of contact in the work of the maestro of Italian opera and the contemporary Austrian composer Matthias Georg Kendlinger – it is always people who take centre stage.

Tan Dun conducts Beethoven's Symphony No. 9

The SummerConcerts powered by VriendenLoterij present two months of wonderful concerts, from classical to jazz and from pop music to film scores. Top musicians from the Netherlands and around the world bring you all your favourite classical pieces, as well as tributes to Leonard Cohen and The Beatles, and all your favourite film music.We also present a host of young talent in our summer concerts, including youth orchestras from South Africa and Turkey, and top young classical soloists. After many of the concerts, we offer a meet-and-greet with the artists in an informal setting, or an afterparty with DJ in the Entrance Hall. In one of the world’s finest concert halls, there’s something for everyone this summer at The Concertgebouw!

Simone Young conducts Bruckner and Rihm

When Simone Young conducts Bruckner, she prefers to perform the original versions of his symphonies: “Perhaps they are not as perfect as the later versions,” she explains. “But they have a modernity that the later ones lack.” In this concert, she presents the original version of the Second Symphony from 1872, and combines it with Wolfgang Rihm’s one-act opera Das Gehege. This dark and enigmatic piece depicts a woman who, on the eve of German reunification, frees an eagle from captivity, tries to seduce it, and ultimately kills it.

Simone Young conducts Bruckner and Rihm

When Simone Young conducts Bruckner, she prefers to perform the original versions of his symphonies: “Perhaps they are not as perfect as the later versions,” she explains. “But they have a modernity that the later ones lack.” In this concert, she presents the original version of the Second Symphony from 1872, and combines it with Wolfgang Rihm’s one-act opera Das Gehege. This dark and enigmatic piece depicts a woman who, on the eve of German reunification, frees an eagle from captivity, tries to seduce it, and ultimately kills it.