Hornist

Entertaining and colorful stories are told in Monday Concert 1 at the Beethoven House: stories in music, performed by a powerful and dazzling ensemble of wind instruments, double bass, and piano. We travel with Fazıl Say to a small Anatolian village, observe the crowds on the Parisian boulevards (including pin-up girls and aging beauties...) with Francis Poulenc and Jean Françaix, and serenade our loved ones as a Spanish jester!

Villages and Boulevards

Beethoven-Haus Bonn

Gingerbread and candy canes, candlelight and the smell of pine needles – Christmas days are filled with cosiness and magic. Even for Clara and her new friend, the Nutcracker. The two of them take you on a Christmas adventure into the fantastic realm of the Mouse King and Princess Pirlepat.

Crack nuts and start dancing

Theater Bonn Opera House

Large-scale chamber music with piano from the Romantic period almost always means expansive arrangements, sweeping themes, sharp contrasts and tonal opulence. Our solo horn player, Geoffrey Winter, has put together a program for the opening of our chamber concert season at the Beethoven-Haus, in which Johannes Brahms‘ early horn trio is certainly the best-known piece, but not the longest. Why do composers compose? The highly romantic program around piano and horn, one piece more beautiful than the other, provides three answers to this question – and we find that these answers do not allow any conclusions to be drawn about the nature of the composition, its quality, its accessibility or its details: The young Johannes Brahms composed (at least part of) his trio when he was mourning the death of his mother. Mourning, coming to terms with the death of a loved one. Walter Rabl submitted his Quartet op. 1 to a composition competition and won a prize – the jury included none other than the now graying and famous Johannes Brahms. And Zdeněk Fibich’s themes for his piano quintet come in part from his thoroughly erotic musical diary, a collection of hundreds of piano pieces that the composer wrote for his lover, pupil and librettist Anežka Schulzová. And what does this music do to us? Everyone has to find out for themselves …

Piano quintet

Our musicians are not only first-class orchestra members, high-ranking soloists and enthusiastic chamber musicians: They are also part of the large network of musicians spanning all genres. Whether they make excursions into non-European music, like Hans Joachim Mohrmann, or help young musicians to get started, like Thomas Ludes: An orchestra is a nucleus for cultural and social activities, far beyond our own work! For example, there is the connection to the singers of the theater: when Thomas Ludes asked Marie Heeschen if she would like to do an evening with a wind quintet, she immediately and spontaneously agreed. Such a quintet as Solisti Bonna is a true musical chameleon that adapts to the circumstances and the partners and takes us into different musical realms with its countless colors. And so we can look forward to an evening with Marie Heeschen's bell-bright soprano voice and the virtuoso sounds of Solisti Bonna : In the first part with the tongue-in-cheek Paul Hindemith and some dazzling songs by Gustav Mahler, in the second part with pure romanticism: Briccialdi's quintet and the balmy airs breathing Les nuits d'ete by Hector Berlioz.

Wunderhorn

Old Federal Councilor

Chickens juggle eggs, donkeys can barely escape amorous horses, and fish perform an addictive dance in their colorful, shimmering scales. THIS is the Carnival of Animals! The biggest animal spectacle of the year, the most unforgettable show, the most exhilarating gathering—and with you, it's even better!

Hornist

Geoffrey Winter

Events

Upcoming events

25 - 26 Jan, 2026

Carnival of Animals · Beethoven Orchester Bonn

Past events

Dec 1, 2025

Villages and Boulevards · Beethoven Orchester Bonn

1 - 2 Dec, 2024

Crack nuts and start dancing · Beethoven Orchester Bonn

Future and recently performed repertoire

Horn in Horn Trio by Brahms

Beethoven Orchester Bonn

Horn in The Nutcracker by Tchaikovsky

Beethoven Orchester Bonn

Horn in Wind Quintet No. 1 by Briccialdi

Beethoven Orchester Bonn

Horn in Sextet, FP 100 by Poulenc

Beethoven Orchester Bonn

Horn in Small Chamber Music for Wind Quintet by Hindemith

Beethoven Orchester Bonn

Horn in Fazil Say's Alevi dedeler rakı masasında by Say

Beethoven Orchester Bonn

Horn in L'heure du berger (The Hour of the Shepherd) by Françaix

Beethoven Orchester Bonn

Horn in The Carnival of Animals by Saint-Saëns

Beethoven Orchester Bonn

About

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