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The Estonian National Male Choir make a strong impression, while Jennifer Pike excels in a cornerstone of her repertoire. 

Even in a festival anchored around a handful of 20th-century composers touched by the presence of war – Benjamin Britten, Dmitri Shostakovich, Béla Bartók, Witold Lutosławski – the program on Thursday night with the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin and their chief conductor, Marek Janowski, was especially haunted by the memory of atrocity. It was a night of tough music with little reprieve.

Zu Beginn seiner letzten Spielzeit als Chefdirigent gab Teodor Currentzis mit Schostakowitschs 13. Symphonie „Babi Jar” ein klares Statement ab: gegen Krieg, Gewalt und Unterdrückung und für das Mitempfinden mit den Opfern.