Concertino

‘The Concertino for trumpet with seven solo instruments was the first composition by Karl Amadeus Hartmann to be heard outside Germany. Hermann Scherchen, who smoothed the way for the young composer from Munich, conducted the world première in Strasbourg on 12 August 1933 as part of a conference on the subject of “15 Years of New Music“. But, the piece, hailed as a sensational success, disappeared into a drawer: Hartmann was not interested in performances of his work in National Socialist Germany. Hartmann handed the manuscript over to the principal trumpet of the Concertgebouw Orchestra, Marinus Komst, with whom it gradually fell into oblivion. It was not until 2001 that the manuscript reached the public again through Freddy Grin, also a trumpeter with the Concertgebouw. The revival of the Concertino took place at the Hamburg Music Festival on 22 September 2002. Ingo Metzmacher conducted the Philharmonic State Orchestra Hamburg, the soloist was Håkan Hardenberger. The Concertino shows a different side to the Expressionist symphonic composer Hartmann: happy, carefree, jazzy. This music was influenced by Stravinsky who “in the 1920s became the epitome of musical bravery for us Germans“ (Hartmann) and whose opening melody of “Sacre“ is woven thematically in the second movement.’ (Christoph Becher in the foreword to the first edition; TR 21)