Programme Guide

Conductor and choirmaster John Eliot Gardiner once said: “They were the vessels for some of his most profound thoughts, revealing at times an almost desperate urge to communicate things of import. Solemnity, pathos, terror and jubilation are all experienced and encapsulated.” Here, Christian Thielemann, one of the most notable interpreters of German late-Romantic music, conducted three of these works: Nänie, Gesang der Parzen and Schicksalslied, with the Rundfunkchor Berlin, partners of the Berliner Philharmoniker for many years, taking on the choral role.

The concert closes with Schoenberg’s tone poem Pelleas und Melisande – a work that, with late-Romantic power and a luscious sound clearly inspired by Richard Wagner and Richard Strauss, recounts Maurice Maeterlinck’s drama of jealousy. The response from the audience and the press to Thielemann’s performance was rapturous. Das Neue Deutschland wrote: “His striving for clear structures and a vibrant sound development was downright triumphant. Intensive, even passionate expressiveness right to the dark ending. The orchestra was magnificent, inspired to even higher musical heights and charisma by Christian Thielemann.”