Since its première in the year 2000, “Classics on Odeonsplatz” has been a highlight of the Munich cultural season. Flanked by stylishly illuminated historical edifices, such as the Theatiner Church and the Residence, some 16,000 people each year thrill to music in this unique atmosphere. The Feldherrnhalle as orchestral platform and the adjoining historical buildings make Odeonsplatz into an open-air arena with magnificent acoustics. On the program arias by Giuseppe VERDI (“Nabucco”, “Aida”, “La Traviata”), Giacomo PUCCINI (“Tosca”, Gianni Schicchi”, “La Bohème”) and Ruggero LEONCAVALLO “I Pagliacci”, amongst others.
Andris Nelsons – Boston Symphony: Inaugural Concert
This event celebrates the start of Andris Nelsons’ tenure as the 15th music director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and features two of the conductor’s close colleagues, the acclaimed Latvian soprano Kristine Opolais and the outstanding German tenor Jonas Kaufmann. Singing’s selections from the Wagnerian and the Italian verismo repertoires, they join forces for a powerful duet from Puccini’s Manon Lescaut. The concert opens with Wagner’s Tannhäuser Overture – the work that first inspired a five year old Nelsons to a life in music – and closes with Respighi’s spectacular orchestral showcases “Pines of Rome”.
Karajan in Japan
Join the maestro Herbert von Karajan and the Berliner Philharmoniker for this eclectic and striking program featuring three masterpieces of the orchestral repertoire! The concert begins with Mozart’s Divertimento No. 17 in B-flat Major. Composed in 1777, the work incarnates Classicist ideals of with its apparent simplicity disguising great sophistication. Richard Strauss’s symphonic poem Don Juan follows: premiered in 1888, the work narrates the story of the famed libertine with a highly virtuosic score. The concert draws to a close with Ottorio Respighi’s Pines of Rome (1924), for which Karajan and the Berliner Philharmoniker prove to be the ideal interpreters of its complex and brilliant orchestration.