Vilde Frang in conversation with Philipp Bohnen (11 min.)

The violinist Vilde Frang initially thought the invitation to make her debut with the Berliner Philharmoniker as a soloist at the 2016 European Concert was an April Fool’s joke. Luckily she was wrong; her performance of Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto in Frang’s native Norway was enthusiastically received. Shortly before Christmas 2017, the musician played with the orchestra in the Philharmonie for the first time. On this occasion, she played Béla Bartók’s First Violin Concerto, a work which is still somewhat overshadowed by the composer’s second contribution to the genre. In this interval feature with the violinist Philipp Bohnen, who has been a member of the Philharmoniker since 2007, Vilde Frang talks about the love story which inspired Bartók to write his posthumously premiered concerto, the challenge to keep well-known works sounding fresh and new, and her preparations for Christmas.