What better occasion for chief conductor Kirill Petrenko to give his Czech debut than to open the Prague Spring Festival with the festival’s signature work? The Berliner hilharmoniker perform Smetana’s Má vlast on the 140th anniversary of the composer’s death in the magnificent Smetana Hall. The combination of one of the best orchestras in the world with their chief conductor and the masterpiece of the Czech “national composer” is an exceptional experience: “The depth of understanding Petrenko showed, the crisp
performance of the players…conferred a new level of prestige and fitting anniversary honors on the Czech Republic’s most beloved composer” (Bachtrack).
Gustav Mahler described his Fifth Symphony as a “cursed work” that “no-one understands”. While the extreme variety of expression actually overwhelmed the audience at the time, the symphony enjoys the highest popularity today, especially thanks to ist gossamer-like Adagietto movement. Gustavo Dudamel, music director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, also conducts Leonard Bernstein’s cheeky occasional piece, Divertimento, which – here in Europe at least – is far too rarely heard. PROGRAM Mahler: Symphony No. 5; Bernstein: Divertimento for Orchestra
City Noir, John Adams’s work for orchestra, is a conglomeration of sophisticated solos, that pays homage to film noir with its title but also with its sinister and sensual sound language. Gustavo Dudamel leads the Berliner Philharmoniker “with lots of humour and real swing through the brilliantly instrumented urban jungle.” (Berliner Morgenpost). In an exciting juxtaposition, the Venezuelan conductor also performs Dvorák’s 9th symphony. Premiered in New York, the colourful work with the nickname “From the New World” brilliantly fuses American impressions and symphonic music. While the Largo can “hardly be imagined in a more noble way”, the Scherzo bursts with great energy, making the endless expanses of the Midwest “almost physically tangible in the swirling stream of sounds” (Tagesspiegel). PROGRAM Dvorak: Symphony No.9; Adams: City Noir
“A Beethoven symphony cycle is a kind of Mount Everest for all of us to climb” Sir Simon Rattle said about his first cycle of all nine symphonies with his Berliner Philharmoniker. The expectations were incredibly high, not only due to the work itself, which is known to be extremely demanding, but also due to the existing legendary recordings of the Beethoven symphonies with Rattle’s predecessors like Herbert von Karajan and latest Claudio Abbado. The concerts in which the Berliner Philharmoniker and their maestro present the symphonies at the Philharmonie are overwhelming indeed. “This is the greatest performance of the Beethoven symphonies as a cycle that I have ever seen and heard” (BBC Music Magazine). “Impressive“ (The New York Times).
Nelsons lives up to his deep adoration of Richard Wagner, his favourite composer, in this concert, where he is conducting the Berliner Philharmoniker, with the Prelude to the First Act and the “Karfreitagszauber” from the Third Act of Wagner’s Parsifal. The second part of the concert is dedicated to another great composer: Anton Bruckner and his 3rd symphony. “With Nelsons conducting, everything diverged into beauty.” (Der Tagesspiegel) “Nelsons worked his magic. Every repetition is a new reason for amazement, from the intimate Trio to the triumphant Final.“ (Berliner Morgenpost) PROGRAM: Wagner: Parsifal Prelude to Act I ; Good Friday Spell from Act III; Bruckner No. 3
Christian Thielemann conducts the Berliner Philharmoniker in a programme of late Romantic French masterpieces, accompanied by the outstanding voices of Christiane Karg, Sophie Koch and Adrian Eröd. Gabriel Fauré’s heart-easing Requiem with its famous “Pie Jesu” is turned into a “magical moment” by Karg’s “divine” way of singing (Kulturradio). Ernest Chausson’s haunting song cycle Poème de l’amour et de la mer, in which Sophie Koch performs “superbly with her dramatic, yet light voice” (FAZ), constitutes the Requiem’s temporal counterpart. Thematically bridging the two works are Debussy’s Danse sacrée and Danse profane for harp and strings, with the orchestra’s principal harp Marie-Pierre Langlamet creating “cascades of artful polyphony in delicate nuances” (FAZ).
Mariss Jansons is one of the leading conductors of his generation and a close friend of the Berliner Philharmoniker. For this special concert he brings works by Bartók, Shostakovich and Ravel to the rostrum and together with the Berliner Philharmoniker he succeeds in “rocking the Berlin Philharmonie” (Süddeutsche Zeitung). For Shostakovich’s 2nd Violin Concerto Jansons and the Berliner Philharmoniker are joined by the German violinist Frank Peter Zimmermann. PROGRAM Bartók: Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta; Ravel: “Daphnis et Chloé”; Shostakovich: Violin Concerto No. 2
Mahler’s Fifth is among the best loved of his symphonies; not least thanks to the Adagietto, made legendary as the soundtrack to Visconti’s Death in Venice. Andris Nelsons on the rostrum of the the Berliner Philharmoniker made this symphony into “a true celebration of beauty and the phenomenal Philharmonic string sound” wrote in Der Tagesspiegel delight. The concert got off to a racing start, too: the “master trumpeter” (Berliner Zeitung) Hakan Hardenberger carried the audience with him in HK Gruber’s trumpet concerto Aerial. After all his showpiece: the composer wrote this BBC Proms commission specially for him. “Hardenberger, the virtuoso supersonic, thrills his audience through and through.” (Berliner Morgenpost)
Christian Thielemann’s international fame rests to a large extent on his interpretations of BRUCKNER. In this concert with the Berliner Philharmoniker he conducts the composer’s most popular work, the Fourth Symphony. As the epithet “Romantic” implies, Bruckner here creates a vision of a better past. The Oboe Concerto by RICHARD STRAUSS which opens the concert has a similarly nostalgic flavour. The soloist is Albrecht Mayer, principal oboist with the Berliner Philharmoniker since 1992.—– Program: Richard STRAUSS, Oboe Concerto in D major; Johann Sebastian BACH, Sinfonia from Cantata BWV 156, Anton BRUCKNER, Symphony No. 4 in E flat major “Romantic”
Commanding the podium with his slender figure, theatrical shock of hair and penetrating blue eyes, Herbert von Karajan projected the hieratic image of the conductor as officiant of some quasi-mystic rite. And anyone who ever saw him conduct live or on his many audiovisual recordings will agree that in his performances, music did indeed become a religion and Karajan its high-priest. Karajan (1908-1989) embodied classical music in the general consciousness as an epoch-making conductor, media star, opera producer, festival director and festival founder. But in spite of his Promethean and widely varied activities, he remained a superb conductor, with a grasp of the standard orchestral and operatic repertory from Mozart to Schoenberg that was unsurpassed among his peers.
