Klaus Mäkelä conducts Stravinsky’s “Firebird”

Play – the seemingly innocuous title that Andrew Norman gave to his work, composed between 2013 and 2016, reveals its philosophical dimension in the composer’s remarks. For it is not so much light-hearted pastimes and games that are the focus, but questions of power and manipulation: “Much of this piece deals with who is playing whom,” says Norman. “The percussionists, for example, spend a large part of their time ‘playing’ the orchestra as if it were an instrument (just as they themselves are ‘played’ as instruments by the conductor, who in turn is ‘played’ by the score).” On three levels – a deliberate allusion to video games – Play explores the orchestra as a self-reflecting mechanism. In this constantly moving musical play – Norman compares it to a puppet theatre – the audience can eagerly follow who is pulling the strings at any given moment. Conductor Klaus Mäkelä is likely to play a central role here: he is very familiar with the work, having conducted its Dutch premiere.

Although not a puppet play, Igor Stravinsky based his ballet The Firebird, which premiered in 1910, on a fairy tale. The main characters – the evil wizard Katschei, the princess he has bewitched, the prince who rescues her, and the wondrous firebird – provide the perfect setting not only musically but also choreographically. Stravinsky, who became famous overnight thanks to this first collaboration with the famous Parisian Ballets Russes, separates the magical-evil world from the real world in his composition: while Katschei is accompanied by a dark, chromatic musical language, the appearance of the prince and princess is dominated by bright, folkloric sounds. There is, however, one puppet moment: called to the prince’s aid, the Firebird literally makes Katschei and his demonic entourage dance to his tune with magical music before singing them to sleep without further ado. Good: 1 – Evil: 0.

Berliner Philharmoniker

Klaus Mäkelä