“Virtuosic sparks” (klassik.com) As Artistic Partner of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, piano virtuoso Yuja Wang not only dazzles at the grand piano, but also gives her conducting debut. After an amuse-bouche of Mozart’s “precisely articulated and dynamically shaded” Serenade in E flat major, Wang takes the stage with Stravinsky’s Concerto for piano and wind orchestra and concludes the concert with a striking rendition of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue: “With dreamlike chord accuracy and flawlessly rapid repetitions, she presents the rhythmic finesse of Gershwin’s music and demonstrates an unerring sense of jazzy impetus” (klassik.com). Mozart: Serenade for wind instruments, K. 375; Stravinsky: Concerto for piano and wind instruments; Dvorak: Serenade for wind instruments, cello and double bass in D minor, Op. 44; Gershwin: Rhapsody in Blue (arr. Ferde Grofé); Marquez: Danzón No. 2 (arr. Gómez-Tagle)
BBC Proms 2022: Leif Ove Andsnes & Mahler Chamber Orchestra
Leif Ove Andsnes directs the Mahler Chamber Orchestra from the keyboard in an all-Mozart programme including two contrasting piano concertos. “Leif Ove Andsnes and the Mahler Chamber Orchestra collaborated as creative equals, with pristine focus and quicksilver touch.” (The Guardian). PROGRAM Mozart: Overture to “Le nozze di Figaro”, Piano Concerto No. 20, K. 466, Piano Concerto No. 22, K. 482, Piano Concerto No. 23, K. 488 – II. Adagio
A New Chopin – Daniil Trifonov & Mikhail Pletnev
It is one of the most fascinating classical recordings of the year 2017: Daniil Trifonov’s interpretation of the Chopin piano concertos together with the Mahler Chamber Orchestra under the guidance of Mikhail Pletnev. Trifonov and Pletnev are both Russians, pianists and composers. For all these communalities, they are quite different personalities. Trifonov belongs to the crowd of highly talented and celebrated young pianists who has won numerous competitions and gives more than 100 concerts a year. In contrast, the Grammy-award-winner Pletnev is known for his intellectual grasp of musical language who might come across a little bit distant. It is a remarkable proof of trust for the young pianist, that Pletnev offers his re-orchestration of the two concertos for Trifonov’s solo recording. Chopin’s music is elegant and deeply personal, but the orchestrations of his concertos are considered makeshift, many assert. There have been several attempts to re-orchestrate them: Will the Pletnev-orchestration add a new dimension to the pieces? This collaboration is likely to be an artistic exploration at the highest stage and consequently, the music documentary „A New Chopin“ takes viewers on a rare tour of the artistic process.
Trifonov plays Chopin
Daniil Trifonov, the current Gramophone Artist of the Year and today’s top young classical pianist, offers Chopin’s two piano concertos in collaboration with his fellow pianist-composer Mikhail Pletnev, who conducts the Mahler Chamber Orchestra in his freshly re-orchestrated editions of Chopin’s piano concertos.
Barbara Hannigan – A Late Night Concert
There are pianists who also conduct, and concertmasters who lead their orchestra from the violin chair. But a star soprano who coordinates a large instrumental ensemble while at the same time negotiating the trickiest coloratura singing is something entirely new. That is, until Barbara Hannigan came along to reveal this remarkable skill. “It’s like walking on virgin snow,” says the Canadian “artiste étoile” who teamed up at Lucerne Festival in Summer with the Mahler Chamber Orchestra. Next to conducting works by Fauré, Mozart and Rossini she performed onstage, decked out in a daring S&M-style leather bodice, Ligeti’s “Mysteries of the Macabre.”
Leif Ove Andsnes plays Mozart
Norwegian pianist Leif Ove Andsnes and the Mahler Chamber Orchestra continue their collaborative exploration of Mozart’s great piano concertos and their surroundings. This large-scale project is receiving acclaim in the most prestigious concert halls as well as award-winning results in the recording studio. In the Great Hall of the Mozarteum, attention is now focused on works composed in 1785/86 that are characterized by ambiguous twilight and expressive instability: It begins with the great Piano Concerto KV 482 with its heartbreaking Andante in C minor, a set of variations that had to be repeated at the premiere; carries over to the “Prague Symphony,” and concludes with the singularly plaintive chromaticism of the C minor Piano Concerto, KV 491 – all testaments to Mozart as arguably the first Romantic composer. PROGRAM Mozart: Piano Concertos KV 482 & 491, KV 504 “Prague Symphony”