Christian Tetzlaff and the Karajan Academy of the Berliner Philharmoniker
There are composers who wrote captivating works in their early years – but who never thought to continue on the same path in their later years. This applies equally to Arnold Schoenberg’s voluptuous, late Romantic tone poem Verklärte Nacht as well as to violin concertos by the 19-year-old Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The Karajan Academy of the Berliner Philharmoniker and Christian Tetzlaff present some of these early gems.
The string sextet Verklärte Nacht, composed in 1899 on the basis of a poem by Richard Dehmel, later arranged by its composer for string orchestra, sets a striking emphasis in Arnold Schoenberg’s compositional development. An unprecedented example of programme music in a chamber music genre, it sounds a call against the musical aesthetics of its time. At the same time, Schoenberg’s face-off with Richard Wagner’s harmony reaches an initial high point in this composition. And then, the poem that serves as the basis for Schoenberg’s composition is about the willingness of a man to accept his partner’s illegitimate child as his own! No wonder that the premiere of this work in 1902 created a huge scandal.
Regardless of programme music or scandals: the members of the Karajan Academy have dedicated themselves to Schoenberg’s captivating late Romantic sounds, as they have to the violin artistry of the young Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart – which is why – besides his C major Rondo – they perform the G major concerto together with Christian Tetzlaff, Artist in Residence of the Berliner Philharmoniker in 2014/15. The concert is rounded off by a performance of Joseph Haydn’s Symphony No. 80 in D minor, a boisterous work that initiated compositional development for the future development of the genre.
© 2015 Berlin Phil Media GmbH
Artists
Our recommendations
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