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Daniel Harding will perform Beethoven’s Fifth Piano Concerto together with Leif Ove Andsnes. Composed in 1809 during the Napoleonic occupation of Vienna, its expansive structure exudes a longing for peace and humanity. Instead of the planned Sinfonia domestica, the second part features two of Richard Strauss’ most popular tone poems, Death and Transfiguration and Don Juan, with which the young composer finally embarked on the path to becoming a “musician of the future”. Strauss established his fame as the leading opera composer of his time a few years later with Salome. The culmination of this ground-breaking work is Salome’s lascivious Dance of the Seven Veils – a dramaturgical and tonal fascination to this day.
Daniel Harding will perform Beethoven’s Fifth Piano Concerto together with Leif Ove Andsnes. Composed in 1809 during the Napoleonic occupation of Vienna, its expansive structure exudes a longing for peace and humanity. Instead of the planned Sinfonia domestica, the second part features two of Richard Strauss’ most popular tone poems, Death and Transfiguration and Don Juan, with which the young composer finally embarked on the path to becoming a “musician of the future”. Strauss established his fame as the leading opera composer of his time a few years later with Salome. The culmination of this ground-breaking work is Salome’s lascivious Dance of the Seven Veils – a dramaturgical and tonal fascination to this day.
Italy in May is always a good idea. The 22-year-old Strauss concurred: following Brahms’ advice, he travelled to Italy in April and May 1886, visiting Florence, Rome, Bologna, Naples and Capri. The four movements of his symphonic fantasy transport the listener to the “Campagna,” “Rome’s Ruins,” and the “Beaches of Sorrento,” before finally plunging into the lively “Neapolitan Folk Life” – a showpiece for the Neapolitan conductor Riccardo Muti, who has frequently performed it during the course of his career, including a performance with the BRSO forty years ago in 1984. With the inclusion of works by Haydn and Schubert as well as the participation of the Chor des Bayerischen Rundfunks, the maestro presents a programme that also features other companions with whom he has long cultivated a close relationship.
Italy in May is always a good idea. The 22-year-old Strauss concurred: following Brahms’ advice, he travelled to Italy in April and May 1886, visiting Florence, Rome, Bologna, Naples and Capri. The four movements of his symphonic fantasy transport the listener to the “Campagna,” “Rome’s Ruins,” and the “Beaches of Sorrento,” before finally plunging into the lively “Neapolitan Folk Life” – a showpiece for the Neapolitan conductor Riccardo Muti, who has frequently performed it during the course of his career, including a performance with the BRSO forty years ago in 1984. With the inclusion of works by Haydn and Schubert as well as the participation of the Chor des Bayerischen Rundfunks, the maestro presents a programme that also features other companions with whom he has long cultivated a close relationship.
Italy in May is always a good idea. The 22-year-old Strauss concurred: following Brahms’ advice, he travelled to Italy in April and May 1886, visiting Florence, Rome, Bologna, Naples and Capri. The four movements of his symphonic fantasy transport the listener to the “Campagna,” “Rome’s Ruins,” and the “Beaches of Sorrento,” before finally plunging into the lively “Neapolitan Folk Life” – a showpiece for the Neapolitan conductor Riccardo Muti, who has frequently performed it during the course of his career, including a performance with the BRSO forty years ago in 1984. With the inclusion of works by Haydn and Schubert as well as the participation of the Chor des Bayerischen Rundfunks, the maestro presents a programme that also features other companions with whom he has long cultivated a close relationship.
This season Tabea Zimmermann, the BRSO’s artist-in-residence, will present an entire series of special concertos for her instrument, the viola. One is William Walton’s Viola Concerto, composed for Lionel Tertis in 1928-29 at the suggestion of the English conductor Thomas Beecham. Tertis, however, felt unequal to its severe demands, and the première was entrusted to Paul Hindemith, a violist who had already written several pieces for his own use. This rarely heard composition will now be played by one of the supreme violists of our time, forming an exciting foil to Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra of 1943. The conductor is the seasoned Bartók specialist Iván Fischer.
This season Tabea Zimmermann, the BRSO’s artist-in-residence, will present an entire series of special concertos for her instrument, the viola. One is William Walton’s Viola Concerto, composed for Lionel Tertis in 1928-29 at the suggestion of the English conductor Thomas Beecham. Tertis, however, felt unequal to its severe demands, and the première was entrusted to Paul Hindemith, a violist who had already written several pieces for his own use. This rarely heard composition will now be played by one of the supreme violists of our time, forming an exciting foil to Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra of 1943. The conductor is the seasoned Bartók specialist Iván Fischer.
This all-Strauss programme spans the composer’s entire life, from the intoxicating vitality of Don Juan, composed at the age of 24, to the melancholy retrospection and farewell that he transmuted into beauty in the Four Last Songs in 1948, a year before his death. The third piece on the programme, Thus Spake Zarathustra, is perhaps the most ambitious of Strauss’s tone-poems: the clash of two disparate tonalities (C major and B major) and the juxtaposition of rigorous musical forms and philosophically-tinged intertitles lend a spellbinding force to this Nietzschean homage. Even without specific references to the historical Zarathustra, Nietzsche and Strauss did much to make Zoroastrianism better known in Europe.
“Rach 3”: thus the name often lovingly bestowed on Rachmaninoff’s Third Piano Concerto. Composed in 1909 for his first American tour, it has always languished somewhat in the shadow of his popular Second Piano Concerto. Yet this very fact reflects its special charisma: it is the longest of Rachmaninoff’s four concertos, is said to contain the greatest number of piano notes per second, and poses the greatest challenges to the soloist’s technique. But its virtuosity is not superficial and bombastic; time and again it is pervaded by gentle hues. The BRSO is delighted to rejoin the Korean pianist Seong-Jin Cho, who stepped in for Lang Lang at a benefit concert in 2018 and has long numbered among the world’s élite.
“Rach 3”: thus the name often lovingly bestowed on Rachmaninoff’s Third Piano Concerto. Composed in 1909 for his first American tour, it has always languished somewhat in the shadow of his popular Second Piano Concerto. Yet this very fact reflects its special charisma: it is the longest of Rachmaninoff’s four concertos, is said to contain the greatest number of piano notes per second, and poses the greatest challenges to the soloist’s technique. But its virtuosity is not superficial and bombastic; time and again it is pervaded by gentle hues. The BRSO is delighted to rejoin the Korean pianist Seong-Jin Cho, who stepped in for Lang Lang at a benefit concert in 2018 and has long numbered among the world’s élite.
The Russian-American pianist Kirill Gerstein will launch his BRSO residency, not with a piano concerto, but with two works for piano and orchestra that beggar comparison in their virtuosity, witty playfulness and range of expression. Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini (1934) and the 21-year-old Strauss’s Burlesque take listeners through a gigantic panoply of moods and sounds, from diabolical fury to saucy parody, from mighty upsurges to the most delicate of reveries. Just the right milieu for Kirill Gerstein, a straddler of musical eras, of classical music and jazz, and an artist of enormous flexibility and exploratory verve. To enrich the brew, Alan Gilbert, the principal conductor of the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra, will present Schoenberg’s brilliant orchestration of Brahms’s Piano Quartet in G minor. Schoenberg’s quip, that his arrangement is Brahms’s fifth symphony, is as cogent today as ever before.
The Russian-American pianist Kirill Gerstein will launch his BRSO residency, not with a piano concerto, but with two works for piano and orchestra that beggar comparison in their virtuosity, witty playfulness and range of expression. Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini (1934) and the 21-year-old Strauss’s Burlesque take listeners through a gigantic panoply of moods and sounds, from diabolical fury to saucy parody, from mighty upsurges to the most delicate of reveries. Just the right milieu for Kirill Gerstein, a straddler of musical eras, of classical music and jazz, and an artist of enormous flexibility and exploratory verve. To enrich the brew, Alan Gilbert, the principal conductor of the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra, will present Schoenberg’s brilliant orchestration of Brahms’s Piano Quartet in G minor. Schoenberg’s quip, that his arrangement is Brahms’s fifth symphony, is as cogent today as ever before.
“Significant, original, mature in its form”: thus Hans von Bülow waxed lyrical at the young Richard Strauss’s Symphony in F minor. Before achieving worldwide fame with his tone-poems, Strauss wrote two classical four-movement symphonies rarely heard in today’s concert halls. Even the BRSO is giving its very first performance of the Second Symphony, a blend of youthful bravado and masterly craftsmanship. A biographical counterpart to this symphony is Elgar’s elegiac Cello Concerto of 1918-19, whose introverted orchestral sound and long, pensive melodic lines from the soloist exude an atmosphere of farewell and nostalgia. The French conductor Marie Jacquot, designated chief conductor of the Royal Danish Theatre Copenhagen, is using this programme to make her BRSO début. She will also introduce the audience to a piece by the Scottish composer David Horne: The Turn of the Tide, after a painting by John Duncan.
“Significant, original, mature in its form”: thus Hans von Bülow waxed lyrical at the young Richard Strauss’s Symphony in F minor. Before achieving worldwide fame with his tone-poems, Strauss wrote two classical four-movement symphonies rarely heard in today’s concert halls. Even the BRSO is giving its very first performance of the Second Symphony, a blend of youthful bravado and masterly craftsmanship. A biographical counterpart to this symphony is Elgar’s elegiac Cello Concerto of 1918-19, whose introverted orchestral sound and long, pensive melodic lines from the soloist exude an atmosphere of farewell and nostalgia. The French conductor Marie Jacquot, designated chief conductor of the Royal Danish Theatre Copenhagen, is using this programme to make her BRSO début. She will also introduce the audience to a piece by the Scottish composer David Horne: The Turn of the Tide, after a painting by John Duncan.
Simon Rattle and Magdalena Kožená will give a quite unusual chamber recital together with friends from London and Berlin – especially for BRSO subscribers. In some of the songs Sir Simon will play the piano, but others are accompanied by a string quartet or wind ensemble, adding choice colours to Magdalena Kožená’s mezzo. Owing to the unusual instrumentation, the chosen works are rarely heard in the concert hall and display a vivid panorama of European art song. A rare highlight!
At least since 2020, when she gave her rousingly acclaimed début at the Salzburg Festival in Così fan tutte, Joana Mallwitz has figured in the top echelon of international conductors. She entered the festival’s history as the first woman to conduct a new opera production, and became a darling of the audience with her at once engaged and effortless artistry. Since 2018 she has also enriched the music life of Nuremberg as the city’s general music director and impassioned musical communicator, and in 2023/24 she will become the principal conductor of the Berlin Konzerthaus Orchestra. For her eagerly awaited BRSO début she has chosen classic repertoire items that demand utmost precision and a fresh approach. On one of her riveting video tours we can already follow her through the rhythmic complexities of Beethoven’s Seventh. As soloist, the BRSO greets the Dutch violinist Janine Jansen, a welcome guest of the orchestra since 2012.
At least since 2020, when she gave her rousingly acclaimed début at the Salzburg Festival in Così fan tutte, Joana Mallwitz has figured in the top echelon of international conductors. She entered the festival’s history as the first woman to conduct a new opera production, and became a darling of the audience with her at once engaged and effortless artistry. Since 2018 she has also enriched the music life of Nuremberg as the city’s general music director and impassioned musical communicator, and in 2023/24 she will become the principal conductor of the Berlin Konzerthaus Orchestra. For her eagerly awaited BRSO début she has chosen classic repertoire items that demand utmost precision and a fresh approach. On one of her riveting video tours we can already follow her through the rhythmic complexities of Beethoven’s Seventh. As soloist, the BRSO greets the Dutch violinist Janine Jansen, a welcome guest of the orchestra since 2012.
For years Mariss Jansons was the principal conductor of both the BRSO and the Amsterdam Concertgebouw Orchestra. If gifted young musicians from two academies now assemble in Munich for a concert, they do so in memory of this great conductor, who left an indelible imprint on both orchestras. Jansons had a firm commitment to talented young orchestral musicians, and the idea of the academy continues in his spirit, helping graduates to find their way into professional orchestras. Now, for the first time since their initial exchange of 2019, the two academies reunite in a concert that straddles the boundaries of Germany and the Netherlands. Wagner’s Siegfried Idyll, George Benjamin’s modernist take on Purcell and Richard Strauss’s Suite from Der Bürger als Edelmann give these young musicians ample opportunity to display their prowess under the baton of Daniel Harding.
Daniel Harding is a welcome guest at the helm of the BRSO. This time he will conduct a programme fully deserving of the title “from adversity to the stars”. Thomas Adès’s The Exterminating Angel Symphony of 2020 was commissioned by several orchestras, including the BRSO. Here he takes up important passages from his like-named opera, premièred at the Salzburg Festival in 2016, and combines them into a four-movement symphony. The starting point was a surrealist film by Luis Buñuel, in which a group of high-bred socialites gather together for a party and are condemned to a nightmarish journey. Adès has supplied music at once exciting and weirdly grotesque. Following this surrealistic vision of Hell there begins a very real heaven-assailing ascent to the heights with Richard Strauss’s Alpine Symphony.
Daniel Harding is a welcome guest at the helm of the BRSO. This time he will conduct a programme fully deserving of the title “from adversity to the stars”. Thomas Adès’s The Exterminating Angel Symphony of 2020 was commissioned by several orchestras, including the BRSO. Here he takes up important passages from his like-named opera, premièred at the Salzburg Festival in 2016, and combines them into a four-movement symphony. The starting point was a surrealist film by Luis Buñuel, in which a group of high-bred socialites gather together for a party and are condemned to a nightmarish journey. Adès has supplied music at once exciting and weirdly grotesque. Following this surrealistic vision of Hell there begins a very real heaven-assailing ascent to the heights with Richard Strauss’s Alpine Symphony.
One subject dominates the ecstatic scores that Daniele Gatti has chosen for this concert: love’s boundless rapture. For Don Juan, the suave ladies’ man, Strauss took his inspiration from a poem by Lenau: “O magic realm, illimited, eternal, / Of gloried women, loveliness supernal! / Fain would I, in the storm of stressful bliss, / Expire upon the last one’s lingering kiss!” Things that flew a thousandfold to Don Juan were denied to the autobiographical hero of Berlioz’s Symphonie fantastique, who seeks his beloved in vain. In his mind she becomes a torturous idée fixe until he turns to drugs and takes part in a hallucinatory witches’ sabbath featuring his own execution. Both men – Don Juan and Berlioz’s hero – constantly cross red lines. And Die Meistersinger? Here the hero sings of love with divine inspiration and wins the prize – in this case, anachronistically enough, a woman named Eve.
One subject dominates the ecstatic scores that Daniele Gatti has chosen for this concert: love’s boundless rapture. For Don Juan, the suave ladies’ man, Strauss took his inspiration from a poem by Lenau: “O magic realm, illimited, eternal, / Of gloried women, loveliness supernal! / Fain would I, in the storm of stressful bliss, / Expire upon the last one’s lingering kiss!” Things that flew a thousandfold to Don Juan were denied to the autobiographical hero of Berlioz’s Symphonie fantastique, who seeks his beloved in vain. In his mind she becomes a torturous idée fixe until he turns to drugs and takes part in a hallucinatory witches’ sabbath featuring his own execution. Both men – Don Juan and Berlioz’s hero – constantly cross red lines. And Die Meistersinger? Here the hero sings of love with divine inspiration and wins the prize – in this case, anachronistically enough, a woman named Eve.
Composed in 1785, Mozart’s K 478 was his first contribution to the piano quartet genre. The emotionality of the opening movement’s minore key and the subtly wrought dialogue between strings and piano proclaim its high artistic standards. No less brilliant is the Piano Quartet composed 100 years later by the young Richard Strauss. In his youthful élan he vacillates between engagement with romantic models (especially Brahms) and harbingers of his own style. The ennoblement of the clarinet as a chamber music instrument takes us back to Mozart. To the present day, many works owe their existence to the challenge of blending its timbre with the strings. The same is true of Veress’s Trio of 1972 and Penderecki’s Quartet of 1993, whose elegiac finale also pays tribute to Schubert’s C major Quintet.
The concert opens with Serenade in E-flat major for 13 wind instruments (op. 7), composed by Richard Strauss at the age of 17. This journeyman piece already sparkles with the typical Straussian inflection. His Four Lieder of 1894 (op. 27), sung by Camilla Nylund, are gems of the late-romantic repertoire. Five years later Arnold Schoenberg wrote his string sextet Transfigured Night after a poem by Richard Dehmel. Poised between late romanticism and the burgeoning modern era, this gripping work was arranged for string orchestra in 1917, producing an even more sophisticated interplay of solo and ensemble passages.