Keywords: Symphony Concert, Vocal Music
| Petr Popelka | Conductor |
| Hanna-Elisabeth Müller | Soprano |
| Anna Vinnitskaya | Piano |
| Wiener Symphoniker |
| Richard Wagner | "A Faust Overture" in D minor WWV 59 (revised version) |
| Maurice Ravel | Concerto for piano (left hand) and orchestra in D major |
| Alban Berg | "Seven Early Songs" for high voice and orchestra |
| Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart | Symphony No. 41 in C major KV 551 "Jupiter" |
These events are similar in terms of concept, place, musicians or the program.
Marie Jacquot, former Principal Conductor of Deutsche Oper am Rhein, returns to Cologne with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, featuring rising star violinist María Dueñas performing Max Bruch's Violin Concerto and concluding with Beethoven's Symphony No. 5.
Haydn's "Missa in angustiis," his only mass in a minor key, reflects the turbulent times of the Napoleonic Wars. Beethoven's Symphony No. 2, written as his deafness began, is surprisingly playful and full of contrast. Mozart's Symphony No. 1, composed at the age of eight, reveals a composer brimming with energy, imagination, and original ideas.
Haydn's "Missa in angustiis," his only mass in a minor key, reflects the turbulent times of the Napoleonic Wars. Beethoven's Symphony No. 2, written as his deafness began, is surprisingly playful and full of contrast. Mozart's Symphony No. 1, composed at the age of eight, reveals a composer brimming with energy, imagination, and original ideas.
Luciano Berio, a prominent 20th-century Italian composer, had a unique relationship with tradition, creating numerous arrangements and transcriptions of various composers. In his 1989 work "Rendering," based on Schubert's unfinished Symphony No. 10, his arranging and composing skills merge. Berio likened his restoration approach to that of frescoes, reviving old colors without hiding time's damage. 1907 was a devastating year for Mahler, marked by his daughter's death, a heart condition diagnosis, anti-Semitic attacks, and his resignation from the Vienna Court Opera. Seeking solace, he found "The Chinese Flute," which inspired "Das Lied von der Erde," his personal farewell to the world, with the final song, "Der Abschied," being the longest.
What a love-struck score: »Roméo et Juliette, dramatic symphony, with chorus, vocal solos and prologue as choral recitative, after Shakespeare’s tragedy, dedicated to Niccolò Paganini« – what a wealth of lyrical tones, what enchanting moments, even bizarre, irrational ones, what lush harmonies and ravishing melodic arcs! Its creator Hector Berlioz himself was in an exceptional state: »What a passionate life I led during this whole time! With what vigour I swam in this vast sea of poetry, caressed by the exuberant breeze of fantasy, under the warm rays of Shakespeare’s sun of love, and trusting in my strength to reach the wonderful island where the temple of pure art rises.« With »Roméo et Juliette«, Berlioz had – after a long search – finally created his symphonic theatre of dreams.
As Hamburg’s oldest amateur symphony orchestra, the Hamburger Orchestergemeinschaft from 1904 organises at least two concerts a year. Time and again, the orchestra gives young, very talented conductors and soloists the opportunity to gain experience with public performances in large concert halls. For the anniversary concert, the orchestra under the direction of Wolf Tobias M. Müller showcases its musical breadth with a colourful bouquet of overtures and arias from Mozart to Puccini as well as Schubert’s »Unfinished« Symphony. To celebrate the anniversiary, a new percussion concerto by Fredrik Schwenk will be premiered.
"Women, you angels of the earth! Heaven's loveliest creation! You are the sole ray that illuminates our lives." (Alphonse de Lamartine) We start with the meaning-laden Adagietto from Mahler's Fifth Symphony, inspired in 1901 by his blossoming love for his future wife Alma. A musical marriage proposal with strings and harp, it is a beguilingly beautiful work, albeit shot through with hauntingly world-weary and nostalgic tones. Like many great composers, Richard Strauss had a strong woman at his side – the singer Pauline, for whom he composed many of his vocal works. His lush "Four Last Songs" strike a tone of farewell. These settings of texts by Hesse and Eichendorff were written in 1948, when Strauss’ world had been shattered by the war and he was growing “weary of wandering”, to quote the final line of the last song. While profound grief can often stifle creativity, it sometimes can also awaken new creative energies – as proven by our programme’s emotional final piece, a "work of superhuman strength" written by Josef Suk, who had close personal ties with Dvořák. He became not only the latter’s master student, but also his friend and son-in-law as well, falling in love with Dvořák’s daughter Otylka. But this happiness was abruptly destroyed by Dvořák’s demise in 1904 and the tragically early death of Otylka a mere fourteen months later. Suk wrote the moving symphony "Asrael" to overcome this trauma and in memory of his loved ones, saying: "Such misfortune either destroys a person or brings all the forces lying dormant in them to the surface. Music saved me."
Concert Pulse