Almost every June from 1989 to 1999, I visited the charming town of Feldkirch, in the Vorarlberg region of Western Austria, for the annual Schubertiade, originally founded in 1976 by the great German baritone Hermann Prey.
Ater seven years at the helm and a controversial early departure, Thomas Hengelbrock gives his final concerts as principal conductor of the oldest German radio orchestra.
Celebrating the 150th anniversary of its first performance, Paavo Järvi directs the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen in Brahms' Requiem, with the Latvian State Choir and two outstanding soloists.
Despite some fascinating, impressive and often beautiful moments, the consistent refusal to give the audience time to applaud, pause and digest what they had just heard turned the evening into a wash of death songs.
A skilfully constructed production, and one that plays with the our perspectives. Whether the images are flashbacks from a war-troubled Wozzeck or a Büchner-esque portent of the horrors to come is left for the audience to decide.
A religious-themed program made for a particularly moving Easter weekend concert from Dutoit and the CSO, highlighted by the serenity of Fauré’s Requiem.
Sir David McVicar's production of Tristan und Isolde premiered at the Wiener Staatsoper in 2013, and was then recognized as a friendly platform for singers. Here it is freshly revived with a new cast.
Joining Music Director Jaap van Zweden were some familiar faces who had appeared in Das Rheingold and Die Walküre in the same or different roles, and new faces appearing for the first time.
The Doors of Perception swung wide at Symphony Hall as Charles Dutoit led the Boston Symphony in an unusual and engrossing pairing of Mozart’s boisterous, Haydenesque Symphony no. 39 in E flat, K543, and Bartók’s one-act opera, Duke Bluebeard’s Castle,
Baritone Matthias Goerne and pianist Daniil Trifonov combined their talents to explore the darker side of human existence in an intense, uninterrupted 90-minute recital.
Boston Symphony Orchestra Music Director Andris Nelsons experienced his first time leading the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra – and hundreds of other performers – in Mahler’s Symphony no. 8.
Pianist Markus Hinterhäuser’s brilliantly curated Winterreise juxtaposes the devastating interpretative powers of baritone Matthias Goerne with captivating animated images by William Kentridge.
Despite Richard Strauss' few connections with Leipzig, the Gewandhaus Orchestra under Riccardo Chailly offered a vivdly characterized tribute to the composer on his 150th anniversary, from an affectionate Don Quixote to a witty - and furiously paced - Till Eulenspiegel.
Dallas Symphony Orchestra, led by Jaap van Zweden and featuring baritone Matthias Goerne, performed music by Britten, Mahler, and Brahms, in a concert where not enough was ultimately said, despite a strong return from Goerne.
Composed for the consecration of the new Coventry Cathedral in 1962, Benjamin Britten’s War Requiem is a monumental setting of the words of the Latin Mass, interspersed with the poignant poetry of Wilfred Owen.
The first of three recitals celebrating the German baritone Matthias Goerne took place at Wigmore Hall this past Wednesday. Goerne is a favorite of the Hall, having received the Wigmore Hall medal in 2011.
A night drawn mostly from a gentler range of sounds, some more familiar, some stranger. Esa-Pekka Salonen and the Philharmonia Orchestra London brought classics from Debussy and Ravel to the Philharmonie in Berlin, and paired them with two works by Lutosławski: the intricate and incredible Third Symphony, and Les espaces du sommeil, something between a monodrama and a song accompanied by orchestr
It is an extraordinary feat to take on Schubert’s Winterreise, Die Schöne Müllerin and Schwanengesang in three concerts over only five days, and performing them in Vienna’s Musikverein certainly does nothing to relieve the pressure.
In An Attitude to French Culture the Polish composer Witold Lutosławski remarked “I am aware that of the two traditions that initiated 20th-century music, that is, Schoenberg and Debussy, it is the latter that I feel prevails in my own compositional work”.
Size mattered in this programme, whether in the form of piano originals filled out to orchestral proportions, or Romantic reach reined in by Classical sensibility. The evening’s opening gesture was down to one man, Ian White, whose muted trombone ushered in Webern’s orchestration of the Ricercar from Bach’s 1747 Musical Offering.
Disney Hall’s week-long tribute to the music of Franz Schubert came to a grand close last Friday. Or should that be “Great?” As in Schubert’s hour-long Symphony no. 9, also known as the “Great.” And great it certainly is: not merely in the symphony’s musical material, which is some of the finest ever crafted by this composer. But also great in its proportions.
Late in life, the conductor Bruno Walter would often recall the moment Gustav Mahler first showed him the manuscript to the as yet unperformed Das Lied von der Erde. The work, with its poignancy and profound world-weariness, seemed even to take its composer aback. “But don’t you think it’ll make people want to do away with themselves?,” he said of the work.
It is one of those strange – but ultimately fortuitous – ironies of history that a set of poems intended to be a satire of the gloomy, luckless romances that burst forth from Europe in the wake of Goethe’s Sorrows of Young Werther should itself become the heartbroken romance par excellence.
Benjamin Britten’s War Requiem is a monumental piece of music: literally, architecturally and aesthetically. It is a literal monument because of its creation for Coventry Cathedral, that architectural testament to the creative and destructive powers of man.
The Dallas Symphony Orchestra opened their latest series on Thursday with works by John Luther Adams, Schubert, Richard Strauss, and Shostakovich. The German baritone Matthias Goerne joined the DSO and Artistic Director Jaap van Zweden for a performance that was moving and powerful enough to far outshine a couple of puzzling managerial decisions.
The songs of Des Knaben Wunderhorn ("The Youth’s Magic Horn") form the basis for so much of Mahler’s music that it pays to hear some of them alongside a symphony (in the case the well-known Fifth Symphony, in the latest of the Philharmonia/Maazel collaborations).
Programme de raretés à la Philharmonie : Michael Sanderling dirigeait pour la première fois l'Orchestre de Paris, dans les Jedermann de Franck Martin et la Dante-Symphonie de Franz Liszt.
En guise d'ouverture de saison à l'Opéra de Paris, le Tristan de Peter Sellars et Bill Viola laisse les wagnériens sur leur faim, malgré un grand Philippe Jordan.
L’Orchestre National de France clôt sa saison le soir du 14 juillet lors du Concert de Paris, au pied de la tour Eiffel, en compagnie de quelques-unes des stars lyriques les plus en vue du moment.
El segundo oratorio de Mendelssohn es tan fundamental como lamentablemente infrecuente en las salas de concierto, en parte debido a las proporciones monumentales de la obra. Que semejante envergadura, afortunadamente, no está radicada tan solo en el número de efectivos que la ejecutan, permea cada pentagrama de la obra fue la principal conclusión que cabe extraer del concierto liderado por Heras-Casado.
Die Münchner Philharmoniker boten unter Michael Sanderling ein packendes Programm mit Beethoven und Schostakowitsch. Die Symphonie Nr. 13 "Babij Jar" konnte dabei den nachhaltigsten Eindruck hinterlassen.
S'agirait-il du voyage le plus abouti que Matthias Goerne ait donné à Paris ? Tous les symptômes portaient à le croire : l'endurante concentration du propos, l’intransigeance artistique et avec ça le clavier complice d'Andsnes !
Innigkeit und Autorität der Interpretation von Stimme und Klavier vereint bei einem Liederabend der ganz besonderen Art in der romanischen Kirche von Rougemont
Zubin Mehta gibt den Wiener Philharmoniker in einem historischen Programm Zeit zur Entfaltung; Matthias Goerne bietet eine vielseitige Interpretation von Mahlers Kindertotenlieder.
Le 11 mai 2016, Christoph Eschenbach revient diriger l'Orchestre de Paris comme chaque saison. Au programme : des airs de Wagner par Matthias Goerne, et une symphonie de Brahms. Un concert doublement intéressant, donnés par des musiciens inspirés et en pleine forme !
Le 2 juillet au Wigmore Hall, le baryton Matthias Goerne et le pianiste Menahem Pressler présentaient un programme Schumann à l'ambiance très intimiste devant une salle comble. Une escapade musicale bouleversante.
