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On 17 August, a new production of Verdi’s Nabucco will be staged at Burgplatz Open Air in Braunschweig. The production uses the revised edition published by Verlagsgruppe Hermann, available through Schott Music. The Hermann edition is an authoritative final edition of the opera that includes all the changes the composer made following the work’s initial publication.



Nabucco was composed during a difficult period for the young Verdi. He had recently lost his wife, and his latest opera Un giorno di regno had been a failure. The premiere performance of Nabucco in 1842, however, seemed to mark a change in the composer’s fortune. Following the world premiere, more than 50 performances of Nabucco were given at La Scala. The work’s success was immediately followed by new productions on international opera stages and activity in the following years marked Verdi as one of Europe’s foremost opera composers.

Thus saith the Lord, Behold, I shall deliver this city into the hand of the King of Babylon, and he will burn it with fire - after Jeremiah 21:10, heading to the first part of Nabucco

Nabucco is the short form of the Italian name of the Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar. Under his reign, the Babylonians conquered Jerusalem and enslaved the Hebrews. The plot of Verdi’s Nabucco is set against this backdrop.

Giuseppe Verdi: Nabucco - Biblical opera with a timeless subject

Nabucco owes its success to both its mastery of dramatic tension and its thrilling music. With a fine sense for the effect of melody, rhythm and harmony, Verdi expresses the fears and hopes of the hostile people. His unique treatment of the orchestra supports the singer’s expression, for example when Hebrew priest Zaccaria in prayer is accompanied by a lone cello.

Nabucco runs at the Burgplatz in Braunschweig until the beginning of September with director Klaus Christian Schreiber and musical director Srba Dinić. On the first night, the cast will include Ivan Krutikov, Yulianna Bawarska, Kwonsoo Jeon, Dorothea Spilger and Jisang Ryu in the main roles. Another production of Nabucco opens at Semperoper Dresden in November this year.

 

• Giuseppe Verdi - profile


• Nabucco - work details


• Staatstheater Braunschweig

 

Photo: © Semperoper Dresden/Ludwig Olah

On 8 August 2019, BBC National Orchestra and Chorus of Wales conducted by Tadaaki Otaka will give the world premiere of Huw Watkins’ new work The Moon at the BBC Proms. The work, which has been inspired by the fiftieth anniversary of the moon landing on 20 July 1969, is the result of a major BBC Radio 3 commission for chorus and orchestra that will be further augmented by the Royal Albert Hall’s organ.

The piece tries to capture our experience of viewing the moon from Earth, and is also somehow about looking back at us here on Earth from above. – Huw Watkins

Rather than dealing with the moon landing directly, Watkins’ new work instead explores the collective experience of wonder, and sometimes unease, associated with the moon and space. The Moon is composed in a single movement spanning twenty minutes during which listeners are guiding through their journey by settings of poetry by Percy B. Shelley, Philip Larkin and Walt Whitman.

Huw Watkins: The Moon - Inspired by the moon landing

The Moon is Watkins’ third work composed for BBC NOW as Composer in Association with the orchestra. During his tenure, the orchestra has given performances of many of his existing orchestral and chamber works, as well as premiered the Cello Concerto (2016), written for his brother Paul Watkins and first performed at the BBC Proms under Thomas Søndergård, and Spring (2017) for orchestra.

 

• Huw Watkins - profile


• The Moon - work details


• BBC Proms

 

Photo: © B Ealovega

“O Fortuna” – this appeal to the goddess of destiny marks the beginning of the well-known cantata Carmina Burana by Carl Orff. Many have heard this work used in the soundtracks of film, television and advertisements, or in one of its countless concert performances around the world. This summer, audiences in Germany can enjoy performances at the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival on 2 August and at the Rheingau Musik Festival on 4 August, both conducted by Justus Frantz with the Philharmonie der Nationen. Also on 4 August, the Hitachi Philharmonic Orchestra and conductor Hideaki Muto will perform the work at the Tokyo Metropolitan Theatre.



The origin of Orff’s most famous work was a collection of more than 250 medieval poems, songs and dramas, the “Carmina Burana” (or “Songs from Benediktbeurern”), named after the Bavarian monastery in which the collection was found in the early 19^th century. The texts are in different medieval languages and deal with a variety of themes: Love and drinking songs are side by side with chants of mourning and spiritual anthems. Orff became acquainted with the collection in 1934 and was fascinated by the texts.

Picture and word seized hold of me. Although for the moment I was acquainted only along general lines with the contents of the collection of poems, a new work – a stage work with singing and dancing choruses, simply following the illustrations and the texts – at once came into my mind. – Carl Orff

Orff combined 24 of the collection’s texts to form his new work. He worked freely with the collection, mixing medieval Latin, Middle High German and old French sources, sometimes using single verses and bringing them into a new order.

Carl Orff: Carmina Burana – Dramatic cantata with medieval texts

Although the “Carmina Burana” contains hints for a musical shaping of its texts, Orff composed the music for his Carmina Burana completely anew. Nevertheless, there are echoes of the medieval in Orff’s music in his use of church modes and sustained harmonies. He renounces the musical development of themes and melodies in favour of a more repetitive form.

Today, Carmina Burana is performed mainly in concert rather than staged as Orff originally conceived, though the piece can and has formed the bases for danced or dramatic realisations. A starting point for such a production can be found in the work’s three-part dramaturgy, with its sections entitled “Primo vere”, around the theme of spring both in nature and in human relationships, “In taberna” depicting a tavern scene, and “Cours d’amour” exploring the pleasure and despair associated with love. The monumental appeal to Fortuna frames the three main sections and casts these worldly experiences as divine dispensation.

In addition to the many performances of Carmina Burana, two of Orff’s operas can also be seen in the coming weeks. A new production of his first opera, Gisei, opens on 8 August at the Carl Orff Fest in Andechs, and on 2 October a new reduced version of Die Kluge will be performed in the Munich Gärtnerplatztheater.

 

• Carl Orff - profile


• Carmina Burana - work details


• Schleswig Holstein Musik Festival


• Rheingau Musik Festival


• Hitachi Philharmonic Orchestra

 

Photo: Ludwig Sievert´s draft of the world premiere´s stage design

Erich Wolfgang Korngold’s opera Das Wunder der Heliane (The Miracle of Heliane) has enjoyed a recent period of rediscovery with performances of the work in Brno, Gent, and Freiburg. Last year a production by Deutsche Oper Berlin was awarded “Rediscovery of the year” by Opernwelt magazine. The opera will receive its US premiere this month at the Bard Music Festival as part of the festival’s theme, “Korngold and his world”. The performance will take place on 26 July, performed by the American Symphony Orchestra and conductor Leon Botstein; the director will be Christian Räth.



While the first performance of Das Wunder der Heliane in 1927 was met with praise, the opera failed to mirror the success of Korngold’s first opera, Die tote Stadt, and the work ultimately faded into obscurity. The mixed reception of the opera is in part paralleled by stylistic preferences of the period which favoured naturalistic subjects and characters over the stylized holy figure of Heliane and the miraculous resurrection of a condemned stranger.

Erich Wolfgang Korngold: Das Wunder der Heliane – late romantic homage to love

The real “Miracle of Heliane” is its music. It floods the libretto, waves through the acts, rocks the scenes and the clutter of the dramaturgy. It pours melodies into the figures that overflow into the singing. - Critic Elsa Bienenfeld after the Viennese premiere in 1927

The orchestration of Korngold’s opera incorporates organ, guitar, and fanfare trumpets, which have a symbolic relationship to the subject-matter and foreshadow the composer’s later film music. Korngold’s orchestration responds dramatically to the characters and atmosphere of every scene. The work explores stark contrasts, alternating between hard, rugged and dramatic with passages of extreme warmth. Harmonically, the work exists on the borders of tonality drawing connections between distant tonal centers for dramatic effect.

Das Wunder der Heliane will be performed five times at the Bard Music Festival on 26, 28, 31 July, 2 and 4 August. The festival will also feature a number of Korngold’s other works: in addition to the composer’s film music, there will be performances of Die tote Stadt and concert works including Symphonie in Fis, Cello Concerto in C, and Klavierkonzert in Cis.

 

• Erich Wolfgang Korngold - profile


• Das Wunder der Heliane - work details


• Bard Music Festival

 

Photo: World Premiere at the Hamburgische Staatsoper in 1927

Since its world premiere in 1924, George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue has become one of the most famous symphonic works of the 20th century, and features regularly in the programmes of orchestras around the world. On 21 July, at the Klassik Open Air in the Luitpoldhain in Nuremberg, Joana Mallwitz conducts the Staatsphilharmonie Nürnberg and pianist, Michail Lifits, in a performance of this iconic work.



Towards the end of 1923, famous band leader Paul Whiteman asked Gershwin, who until then had mainly been writing works for Broadway, if he would write a new symphonic jazz work. He requested that the new work be “an experiment in modern music” through which Whiteman and his orchestra could fuse jazz and classical music. It wasn’t until Whiteman informed the press about the new work that Gershwin in fact accepted the commission and started composing the piece.

Nevertheless, Gershwin quickly completed a version of the work for two pianos with annotations for the instrumentation, which was then orchestrated by Whiteman´s arranger Ferde Grofé. At the world premiere of the Rhapsody in Blue on 12 February 1924, Gershwin himself played the piano to an audience which included Igor Stravinsky, Sergei Rachmaninov, and Fritz Kreisler.

As Whiteman’s orchestra frequently performed in various instrumentations, Grofé produced many different orchestrations of Rhapsody in Blue. While this has made it impossible to reconstruct the original orchestration from the work’s premiere, a version for Jazz-Band, which is based on the George and Ira Gershwin Critical Edition is understood to come close. The work’s success led to a number of published versions many of which are available at Schott Music.

George Gershwin: Rhapsody in Blue – Symphonic Jazz for the concert hall

I heard it as a sort of musical kaleidoscope of America, of our vast melting pot, of our unduplicated national pep, of our metropolitan madness. - George Gershwin

Gershwin’s kaleidoscope is expressed in different melodies, which correspond in a rhapsodic open sequence, interrupted frequently by soloistic piano parts. Many chromatic grace notes and accentuated syncopations are just a few of the stylistic mannerisms taken from Jazz music which are intertwined with the language of the orchestra.

Further to the performance in Nuremberg, Rhapsody in Blue will also be performed on 21 July by the Royal Northern College of Music Manchester at the Piazza Grande in Italian Montepulciano. Many of Gershwin’s orchestral works enjoy immense popularity in concert programmes. Audiences at an Open-Air concert at the opera festival in Munich on 20 July will have the opportunity to hear An American in Paris and Gershwin’s Cuban Overture.

• George Gershwin - profile


• Rhapsody in Blue - work details


• Staatsphilharmonie Nürnberg

Peter Eötvös found inspiration for his third violin concerto Alhambra in the picturesque fortress enthroned over the southern Spanish city of Granada from which the work takes its name. The world premiere of the violin concerto will take place on 12 July at the palace of Charles V in the center of Alhambra. Soloist Isabelle Faust and conductor Pablo Heras-Casado – to whom the work is dedicated – will perform with the Mahler Chamber Orchestra.

The intersection of Spanish and Arabic culture, exemplified by the building, has already become part of the tradition of Western art music, thanks to De Falla, Debussy and Ravel (among many others). The fountains of the palace, its dimension, the surrounding mountains, the amazing sunset of Andalusia: all of this became part of my piece.– Peter Eötvös

Alhambra is composed in a single movement in the manner of a rondo, encapsulating various moods and styles from highly gestural and exciting passages to lyrical and mysterious moments. The name ‘Alhambra’ is inscribed literally into the fabric of the violin concerto via a musical cryptogram that assigns each letter to a particular note. The resultant motif is characterised by the intervals of the fifth and the tritone. The music often centers itself on the note G, adding another symbolic connection to Alhambra and the city of Granada.

Peter Eötvös: Alhambra – A musical discovery of the Spanish castle

A mandolin in scordatura tuning is a curious addition to the instrumentation of the concerto, playing an integral role as accompanist to the solo violin. The combination of instruments serves to reflect the history of Alhambra with its Moorish and European influences.

Following the first performance, Alhambra will receive its UK premiere on 24 July at the BBC Proms while later this year on 7 and 8 September the work can be heard in Berlin.

 

• Peter Eötvös - profile


• Alhambra - work details


• Mahler Chamber Orchestra

Fiery beats for a hot summer – that’s what Dos danzas españolas by Joaquín Rodrigo has in store. The driving rhythm of castanets shapes and colours these two Spanish dances, making this entertaining Suite para castañuelas y orquesta perfect for summer concerts. With the theme “Y Viva España”, Mecklenburgische Staatskapelle Schwerin presents music of southern Europe in their Festival “Meckproms”, including Dos danzas españolas with music director Daniel Huppert on 2 July at the open-air stage Schwerin and on 7 July in the garden of Bothmer castle in Klütz.

Rodrigo composed Dos danzas españolas in 1966 for the famous Mexican Flamenco dancer and castanets virtuoso Lucero Tena, whose performances alongside world-class orchestras and conductors played a large role in making the castanets commonplace in the classical orchestra.

Joaquín Rodrigo: Dos danzas españolas – A summery orchestral work

Taking inspiration from Andalusian tonality, Rodrigo creates melodies which, in combination with the castanets’ distinctive rhythms and motifs, form a charming, memorable work.

These two short danzas were written in a bright and straight style, carrying the hallmark of the author. They recreate the Spanish rhythms and themes as well as the stylized atmosphere of majas and bullfighters, very popular in Madrid of the end of the 18th century. – Cecilia Rodrigo on Dos danzas españolas

This summer, more works by Rodrigo can be heard in performances all over the world. This week alone, Amsterdam Sinfonietta perform Fantasía para un gentilhombre on 4 July in Eltville am Rhein, Germany, Concierto de Aranjuez is performed in Hastings, UK on 6 July and in Tokyo a day later, and in Alicante the ADDA Simfònica presents the Concierto andaluz and the Concierto Madrigal on 6 July.

 

• Joaquín Rodrigo - profile


• Dos danzas españolas - work details


• Mecklenburgische Staatskapelle Schwerin

 

Photo: Raimund Germela, Spanish Dancer with castanets

In Nils Holgerssons wunderbare Reise ("Nils Holgersson's Wonderful Journey"), composer Anno Schreier transforms the children’s book "The Wonderful Adventures of Nils" by Swedish author Selma Lagerlöf into a work of music theatre for children aged six and up. Commission by Kölner Philharmonie and KölnMusik for a joint project, "Singing with the class!", it receives its world premiere in Cologne on 27 June 2019. Around 300 local primary school children will take part in the world premiere, singing side by side with the Gürzenich-Orchester Cologne under the baton of Andreas Fellner. Christoph Bertram and Eva Marianne Kraiss will perform Nils and the other characters of the adventure tale.



As a punishment for his naughty behavior, young Nils Holgersson is shrunken to the size of a dwarf. He flies northwards on the back of Martin the goose and a thrilling adventure ensues.

“Nils entirely forgot that he was little and helpless: He leapt right in amongst the flock of geese, throwing his arms around the neck of the gander. “Oh, no! You won´t fly away this time, sir!” he cried. But it was then that the gander was considering how he should go to work to raise himself from the ground. He couldn´t stop to shake the boy off, hence he had to go along with him – up into the air.” - Selma Lagerlöf, The Wonderful Adventures of Nils

Published in 1906, "The Wonderful Adventures of Nils" is more than a simple adventure tale. It was Lagerlöf’s to allow students to explore their home country from a bird´s eye view and, through Nils, come to know virtues such as friendship, trust and responsibility.

Anno Schreier: Nils Holgerssons wunderbare Reise – children’s story as music theatre

Schreier and librettist Alexander Jansen bring the story of the novel forward to the present day. A children´s choir narrates the most important moments of the journey in entertaining and catchy songs, while the roles of Nils and the other characters are played by two actors.

Anno Schreier has already seen great success with previous music theatre works for young people including Der Zauberer von Oz (The Wizard of Oz) and Prinzessin im Eis (Princess in the Ice), as well as with operas from literature like Hamlet, Die Stadt der Blinden (City of the Blind, after José Saramago) and Schade, dass sie eine Hure war ('Tis Pity She's a Whore, after John Ford). His music is characterised by the use of multiple styles and musical quotations, which build into his own distinctive, often grotesque sound. These and others works by Schreier have recently become available from Schott Music.

• Anno Schreier - profile


• Nils Holgerssons wunderbare Reise - work details


• Gürzenich-Orchester Köln

Toru Takemitsu’s evocative work, Rain Coming captures the atmosphere of the moment just before rain has started to fall. The work, which has been widely performed in Europe and the US, will receive its Chinese premiere in Hong Kong on 22 June with Hong Kong Sinfonietta and conductor Ryusuke Numajiri.



Despite minimal orchestration, Takemitsu’s masterful use of every instrument conjures a highly varied sound that seems to be greater than the sum of its parts. The work is a collage of styles and ideas working together as an expressive whole.

Toru Takemitsu: Rain Coming -  Part of the cycle Waterscape

Takemitsu had a special ability for imaging nature through music. His music draws on the legacy of impressionism found earlier in the twentieth century and pursues its aesthetic ideals through the lens of modernity. Rain and images of water were a frequent point of departure and coalescence for Takemitsu; Rain Coming is a part of the composer’s larger Waterscape cycle alongside Garden Rain, Rain Tree, and Rain Spell.

On its way to the sea of tonality, the piece undertakes metamorphoses, much like the circulation of water in the universe. - Toru Takemitsu on Rain Coming

Following the performance in Hong Kong, Rain Coming, will be performed in Aldeburgh on 11 July. At the BBC Proms on 8 August, audiences in London will be able to hear Takemitsu’s Twill by Twilight performed by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales and conductor, Tadaaki Otaka. While also this month, the Ardeo Quartet perform A Way a Lone at Aldeburgh Festival on 20 June, and on 23, Takemitsu’s Twill by Twilight will be performed by the American Modern Orchestra in Saratoga Springs, New York.

 

• Toru Takemitsu - profile


• Rain Coming - work details


• Hong Kong Sinfonietta

The city of Hiroshima in southern Japan was once primarily known for its oysters which were farmed just off the coast. In Noriko Koide’s work Oyster Lullaby, the oyster is symbolic of the process of healing following the devastation that resulted from the use of the atomic bomb in the final month of World War II, an event that has overshadowed the city’s historic reputation. The new work for orchestra, commissioned for the Hiroshima Symphony Orchestra, will receive its world premiere on 14 June 2019 under the baton of Seitaro Ishikawa.



Koide’s inspiration for the piece came during a trip to the oyster beds while visiting Hiroshima – the composer was fascinated by the way they lay in narrow rows like a necklace moving with the rhythmic current of the waves. For Koide, the image of the swaying oysters connects the city’s past with the present day.

Unknown to man, the oysters have absorbed sad memories, since they end of the war they have cleansed and exhaled them, continuing with each breath to slowly bring tranquility back to the sea. - Noriko Koide

Noriko Koide: Oyster Lullaby – Oysters as a symbol of remembrance and cleansing

The healing and breath-like quality of Koide’s piece is produced through a myriad of unpitched, deliberately indeterminate sounds for each instrument in the orchestra and a wealth of percussion. The combination of these techniques evokes a delicate, fragile atmosphere out of which melodic lines appear with striking contrast.

The concert on 14 June 2019 will also include Toshio Hosokawa’s Voyage V and Frederico Gardella’s Two Souls.

 

• Noriko Koide - profile


• Oyster Lullaby - work details


• Hiroshima Happy New Ear