A unique connection to nature becomes music: Dobrinka Tabakova's new orchestral work Rewilding will be premiered at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London on 4 October 2024. The BBC Concert Orchestra will perform the piece for the first time under the direction of Anna-Maria Helsing.
From the background to the limelight: Richard Ayres' work No. 57 (K's Strange Day) for solo timpani and orchestra will be premiered in Helsinki on 4 September 2024. The YLE Radio Symphony Orchestra will perform at Musiikkitalo under the baton of its chief conductor Nicholas Collon.
Ayres wrote his new piece for the orchestra's principal timpanist, Kazutaka Morita. The composer generally uses consecutive numbering for the titles of his pieces, in this case No. 57. The addition (K's Strange Day) can be seen as an allusion to Franz Kafka’s The Trial and the protagonist Josef K. The peculiar thing here is the emergence of the timpani from the background of the orchestra into the limelight. Questions arise: Does the imaginary figure do this voluntarily? In what situation does it find itself? Is she acting or is she subject to the circumstances?
For long stretches, Ayres attempts to create a kind of ‘film without images’ in the audience's imagination. The composer has repeatedly been influenced by early cinema and artists such as Charlie Chaplin. There is often a central character around whom the story revolves.
When I was still playing in orchestras, this person seemed to be a mysterious figure sitting alone behind a wall of huge magical cauldrons. He often seemed to lean over the instrument as if he were talking to it. Half musician, half magician. (Richard Ayres)
No. 57 (K's Strange Day) will be performed again in the same place the day after the premiere. The German premiere can be experienced in May 2025 with the Philharmonisches Staatsorchester Mainz. The next world premiere by Richard Ayres will follow on 13 September 2024 in Amsterdam, where the Asko|Schönberg Ensemble will present Ayres' homage to the current Anton Bruckner year, which is logically entitled No. 58 (Bruckner).
Further Reading:
Richard Ayres: Composer Profile
No. 57 (K's Strange Day): Work Details and Online Score
Website YLE Radio Symphony Orchestra
photo: Miguel Chamorro / Adobe
What does Central Park sound like at night? Charles E. Ives provided an answer to this question 118 years ago with his piece Central Park in the Dark. There will be a new look at this question on 11 August 2024 at the Alte Seilerei in Frankfurt am Main, where Ensemble Modern will premiere Katherine Balch's adaptation.
What does a romantic painting sound like? Christian Jost's new work provides the answer: Eismeer ("Sea of Ice") for saxophone quartet, vibraphone and string orchestra will be premiered on July 26 at the Stadtkirche St. Nikolai with the SIGNUM saxophone quartet and the Zurich Chamber Orchestra. The composer himself will conduct.
A look at the end of time: Wilfried Hiller's new work Apocalypse will be premiered at the ION (International Organ Week Nuremberg) music festival on 2 July 2024. In addition to an instrumental ensemble, Johannes Euler as St John of Patmos, Anna-Lena Elbert as a colouratura soprano and the vocal ensemble Die Singphoniker will be performing in the vocal parts.
Jörg Widmann is currently Composer in Residence with the Berlin Philharmonic. To mark the end of this collaboration, he has composed a new work for the orchestra and its principal horn Stefan Dohr. The Hornkonzert (Horn Concerto) will be premiered on 30 May at the the Philharmonie Berlin under the baton of Sir Simon Rattle, the orchestra's former chief conductor.
Post-apocalyptic scenery in a Gothic church: Thierry Pécou's opera Stalker breaks new ground in music theatre and can be experienced from 22 May 2024 in the St-Ouen Abbey Church in Rouen, where the world premiere will be performed by the Ensemble Variances under the direction of the composer as part of the "Normandie Impressionniste and Curieux Printemps" festival.
Bach inspires. This is the motto of the 2024 Münster Bach Festival, which has commissioned its composer in residence Stefan Heucke to compose a new cantata. His Cantata of Fire (original Title ‘Kantate vom Feuer’) will be premiered at the opening concert on 17 May 2024 in Münster Cathedral. Golo Berg will conduct the Philharmonic Choir and the Münster Symphony Orchestra, with Gerhild Romberger (alto), Thomas Laske (bass) and Gerhard Mohr (narrator) singing.
It is the beginning of a new collaboration: ANDOUNI (Homeless) is the first work by Mary Kouyoumdjian to be published by Schott Music. The New York Philharmonic Orchestra will premiere the new piece on 10.05.2024 at the Wu Tsai Theatre, David Geffen Hall in New York City. Conductor Kwamé Ryan will be at the podium.
One of the most famous German novels in the history of literature: Ludger Vollmer's Buddenbrooks brings Thomas Mann's social study to the opera stage for the first time, more than 120 years after the novel has been first published. On 4 May 2024, the Theater Kiel will present the world premiere of the new opera, directed by Daniel Karasek and conducted by Benjamin Reiners.
english 
deutsch 
français 
