Programmatic highlights for the season finale: Hamburg's major orchestras and top-class guests dedicate more than five weeks to the theme of "War and Peace". At the end of each season, the local orchestras and concert organizers join forces in the Hamburg International Music Festival, which represents the qualitative and quantitative highlight in the already high-class and densely packed concert calendar of the Elbphilharmonie and Laeiszhalle.
This year's guests include superstars such as Sir Simon Rattle, Teodor Currentzis, Christian Thielemann, Janine Jansen, Thomas Hampson, Elisabeth Leonskaja and Daniil Trifonov, jazz piano grandmaster Brad Mehldau and singer and activist Moor Mother. A multifaceted motto always ensures a coherent content - in the current Musikfest edition "War and Peace".
NDR Vokalensemble © Marius Engels/NDR
In view of the current headlines, it is hard to imagine a more fitting overarching theme. The very first piece of the opening concert with the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra, Arnold Schönberg's "Peace on Earth", formulates the universal wish that Ludwig van Beethoven's Ninth Symphony also articulates: "All men shall become brothers." But does it remain an unrealistic utopia, "an illusion for mixed choir", as Schönberg himself admitted, or does it become a tangible goal? How did composers of the past react to wars and existential conflicts?
Alison Balsom © Simon Fowler/Warner Classics
The rest of the festival program revolves around these and other questions, including musical journeys back in time. Several concerts - for example with old master Jordi Savall - present music from the time of the Thirty Years' War. Vladimir Jurowski and his Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin will perform Shostakovich's Eighth Symphony from 1943, an anti-war work par excellence. Portuguese jazz pianist Júlio Resende recalls the peaceful Portuguese Carnation Revolution 50 years ago, while the Dakh Daughters from Ukraine sing against the current Russian invasion.
Separate composer highlights are dedicated to Sofia Gubaidulina, who lives near Hamburg, and Olivier Messiaen, whose only opera "Saint François d'Assise" will be staged by Kent Nagano in a lavish new production. The epilogue of the music festival is Benjamin Britten's "War Requiem", a key work of the 20th century.
April 23 to June 2, 2024
www.elbphilharmonie.de/de/festivals/internationales-musikfest-hamburg
Daniil Trifonov © Dario Acosta
