Sir Simon Rattle

musica viva: Sir Simon Rattle

Simon Rattle’s conducting career is characterized by openness and renewal – and modern music has also played an important role in this. No surprise, then, that when Rattle takes up his post as Chief Conductor of the Chor and Symphonieorchester des BR, he will also conduct a musica viva concert. On the programme: the world premiere of Automatones, written by Vito Žuraj and commissioned by Bavarian Radio’s musica viva series. Extraordinary things are to be expected, since the Rihm student, born in Maribor, Slovenia, in 1979, is always causing a stir: “Contemporary music can be a lot of fun.” (Offenbach-Post) After the intermission, Rattle will conduct Coro for Choir and Orchestra by Luciano Berio: a confessional work in a “tragic mood” (Berio) that has lost none of its relevance today.

Sir Simon Rattle

“The Mount Everest of music”: that’s what American stage director Peter Sellar’s once called Bach’s St Matthew Passion. Now Simon Rattle will scale this summit of western music with his future Munich ensembles, the BRSO and the Bavarian Radio Chorus. The choice team of vocal soloists likewise raises expectations. A key role is conferred upon the Evangelist, who not only relates the story of the Passion, but participates in and responds to it inwardly as a witness. With British tenor Mark Padmore this part will be taken by one of the most charismatic Evangelists of our time. For the BRSO it marks a happy reunion with a longstanding artistic friend – and a former artist-in-residence.

Sir Simon Rattle

On 15 January 2020 the BRSO played a Mahler symphony for the last time before the onset of the pandemic: the “Resurrection” Symphony, in memory of Mariss Jansons. No one could have guessed that Mahler and Bruckner, two pillars of the repertoire, would soon vanish from concert programmes for almost two years. So it is a special sign of hope that the orchestra is finally bringing Mahler symphonies to life again. After the fourth symphony in October under the dircetion of Klaus Mäkelä, the future principal conductor Simon Rattle now conducts the ninth symphony with its nimbus between bold anticipation of modernism and late romantic swan song. For the BRSO, this is at the same time a departure into a new chapter of its Mahler performances, because with Simon Rattle, no less a fervent Mahler aficionado is at the helm of the orchestra as his predecessors Jansons, Maazel and Kubelík once were.

Sir Simon Rattle

On 15 January 2020 the BRSO played a Mahler symphony for the last time before the onset of the pandemic: the “Resurrection” Symphony, in memory of Mariss Jansons. No one could have guessed that Mahler and Bruckner, two pillars of the repertoire, would soon vanish from concert programmes for almost two years. So it is a special sign of hope that the orchestra is finally bringing Mahler symphonies to life again. After the fourth symphony in October under the dircetion of Klaus Mäkelä, the future principal conductor Simon Rattle now conducts the ninth symphony with its nimbus between bold anticipation of modernism and late romantic swan song. For the BRSO, this is at the same time a departure into a new chapter of its Mahler performances, because with Simon Rattle, no less a fervent Mahler aficionado is at the helm of the orchestra as his predecessors Jansons, Maazel and Kubelík once were.

Sir Simon Rattle

Sir Simon Rattle

Sir Simon Rattle

Sir Simon Rattle

Sir Simon Rattle

Simon Rattle felt no hesitation in commencing his tenure as Chief Conductor of the Chor and Symphonieorchester des BR with Haydn’s Creation. “It contains everything. The whole world. It looks both towards the past and far into the future of everything music can be. It is balance and revolution at the same time, a true work of the Enlightenment.” Magnificent choruses, graceful melodies, the finest polyphony, all firmly anchored in an optimistic view of humanity: “Anyone who doesn’t automatically feel better after hearing it really needs help,“ Simon Rattle says with a wink.” The Creation is healthy in a very honest way.” But health also includes a good dose of humor, and Haydn provides it, even in a setting as sacred as the Creation story. At the same time, a work radiating light also casts some shadows on our own present. What has remained of the spirit of the Enlightenment? And what have we done with the “world, so great, so wonderful”?