Name: Pure Shostakovich
Start: 2026-05-22T20:00:00
Location: Hessischer Rundfunk

Boris Giltburg

Kahchun Wong

Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra

His last, great symphony in C major "has resonated among us like none since Beethoven's," wrote Schumann, who so deeply revered Schubert's symphonic legacy. With Kent Nagano, it finds a conductor here who, like few others, can open ears anew to this singular masterpiece. Kent Nagano, however, always brings contemporary music to the forefront. He is particularly fond of the music of Henri Dutilleux, who died in 2013 at the age of 97: Dutilleux was considered the last French classic of modernism and a composer who valued lyricism, poetry, and iridescent timbre. And, as is especially true of the cello concerto "Tout un monde lointain…", the virtuosity—the cello, under the hands of Jan Vogler, is required to perform truly acrobatic feats. Yet Dutilleux never lost touch with his listeners. He, who can be considered the heir of Maurice Ravel in particular, once said that for every young composer there is "the moment when he has to, so to speak, kill his father. Perhaps I haven't done that thoroughly enough. But perhaps that's precisely why my music is more accessible to the public. Although it was never my intention to be understood. I'm simply searching for my absolute truth."

Schubert Symphony in C major

Alte Oper

With a captivating program, the hr-Symphony Orchestra's chamber concert enriches this season's Lauterbach Hohhaus Concerts. Franz Schubert's "Arpeggione" Sonata is among the Viennese Romantic composer's most famous chamber works. Its sonorous soundscape makes it a truly virtuosic piece, which can be experienced alongside two brilliantly compelling chamber music works from the early years of the great operatic dramatist Richard Strauss. The 19-year-old Strauss's Piano Quartet in C minor is considered the pinnacle of his engagement with Brahms. His only violin sonata, composed at the age of 23, was also a stroke of genius.

Arpeggione

Hohhaus Museum Lauterbach e.V.

Hessischer Rundfunk

Is it a concert? Or is it a game? Does the conductor set the tone, or do you, sitting in the Alte Oper, an active participant in this music adventure game? Equally an auditory experience and an experiment, the outcome is open – but that's also part of the game's rules: the music will be magnificent, next-level, no easy mode. The soundtrack to "Game of Thrones," the powerful sounds of "Mars, Bringer of War," the "Danse Macabre," impactful classics by Elgar and Strauss – these and much more are the cornerstones of this interactive adventure game, in which concertgoers guide a story and are thus drawn ever deeper into an auditory adventure. The works of Saint-Saëns to Gustav Holst, from Sibelius to Rachmaninoff form the backdrop, sometimes epically mysterious, sometimes explosive like a final battle. The hr Symphony Orchestra is preparing to take a step into the unknown. Those who dare and embrace it will be rewarded with an experience that no streaming algorithm can offer with such intensity.

Music Adventure Game

Steve Reich's monumental work for choir and orchestra is more than just a piece of minimal music—it's an acoustic metaphor for what science calls "swarm behavior." Countless rhythmic and melodic phrases are interwoven to form a collective structure that is more than the sum of its parts. Reich employs the repetitive patterns typical of his music, which constantly shift in minute ways, causing the soundscape to move as if in slow motion. Not unlike a flock of birds, each individual acts independently, yet together they form a harmonious and structural whole. The Lithuanian composer Justė Janulytė is known for her minimalist, monochromatic soundscapes, which she pours into slow, ethereal processes with a keen sense of perfect dramaturgy. She plays with the merging of individual voices into a collective mass, making the transition almost invisible. Commissioned by the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, Justė Janulytė has been inspired to create a new work for large orchestra, which will have its world premiere at Forum N.

Desert Music

A program that begins in silence, almost in white noise. And that ends in the ecstasy of sound. In Scriabin's mystery music, everything dissolves in a visionary orchestral explosion of color – it was "like an ice bath, cocaine, and rainbows." It was the writer Henry Miller who once raved about "Le poème de l'extase" with this comparison. Premiered in New York in 1908, the music world had never experienced anything like it, and even today this music catapults the audience into a parallel universe. In his concert with the hr-Sinfonieorchester, conductor Oscar Jockel builds the effect layer by layer: After his own meticulously composed nothingness, the simplicity of Schubert's four-hand Fantasy in F minor seems like an intimate secret, the contrasts intensifying with Britten's "Scottish Ballad." Then Debussy's "Jeux" sheds new light – as the conductor says – on the ecstasy of the love dance, with its lively melodies and dissonant harmonies soaring upwards in triple meter. Finally, the "absolute sublimation" is achieved with Scriabin, who, as a trained philosopher, explored not only musical realms of the barely comprehensible.

Poem of Ecstasy

Precocious, prodigy, highly gifted – how can one describe Felix Mendelssohn's musical achievements at an age when today's teenagers are busy striving for high scores in video games? After all, he was already 17 when he wrote an overture that, as a masterpiece, absolutely belongs in the top 10 of classical music. Felix Mendelssohn – he wasn't called the "Mozart of the 19th century" for nothing: no other composer's music sounds so effortless, so ethereal, as if conjured from thin air. The best example of this is his incidental music to Shakespeare's comedy "A Midsummer Night's Dream," this literary classic from the realm of fairies, whose plot is so intricate yet whose wit is so exuberant. Everything takes place in just a few hours of a single night, but when everyone involved is as hyperactive as they are here, and when magic potions come into play, anything can happen. Mendelssohn's music is correspondingly magical: weightless like elves, surprising like the mischievous imp Puck, shimmering like something from distant fantasies. After this pure Mendelssohn evening with the hr-Sinfonieorchester and its chief conductor Alain Altinoglu, a place on cloud nine is guaranteed.

Midsummer Night's Dream

Beauty bordering on the unreal: This is what connects the music from A Midsummer Night's Dream and the Brahms chants with Unsuk Chin's Cello Concerto. The bright, ethereal radiance of Mendelssohn, which seems to defy grounding, is mirrored here in the celestial sounds of the Korean composer. If musicians remained in their comfort zone, the sonic result wouldn't move them, says Unsuk Chin. That's why she always pushes her performers to their limits with what she writes for them. Thus, in this highly sensitive work, not only cellist Alisa Weilerstein, driven to extreme technical realms, but also the musicians of the hr Symphony Orchestra find themselves in a unique and demanding sonic universe – which then superbly prepares both performers and listeners for "A Midsummer Night's Dream," the incidental music by Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy. For here, a magical literary world is captured in music with a weightless delicacy, as no composer has ever achieved before or since.

A Midsummer Night's Dream

For more than 50 years, he has been immersed in the sound world of Johann Sebastian Bach, and even his own name carries an almost magical resonance: Philippe Herreweghe, the Belgian conductor whose music of every era sounds so incredibly clear and elegant. Accordingly, there was considerable excitement when, a few years ago, he declared that he was now "a bit tired of Bach." All the more valuable, then, are the programs that allow one to encounter Philippe Herreweghe and Bach together – as here, with the B minor Suite featuring the popular "Badinerie" and the soprano solo cantata "Mein Herze schwimmt im Blut" (My Heart Swims in Blood), featuring the renowned Dorothee Mields, known for her slender and beautiful soprano. For Philippe Herreweghe, one thing was always clear: he absolutely did not want to be reduced to being a Baroque conductor. That, he says, would be "like an actor only declaiming Shakespeare or Molière. The more I do Bruckner, the better I understand Bach, and vice versa." "That's a good interplay." Not Bruckner, but Franz Schubert is now on his "Baroque+" program, specifically the so-called "unfinished" symphony. Here, too, he will rely entirely on the virtues of clarity and the meticulous attention to detail that make his interpretations so profound. "Others," says Herreweghe, "defend their interpretative freedom, but that's just false routine. I defend the score."

Unfinished

A brass quintet of exceptional caliber. When trumpet, trombone, horn, and tuba come together in the hr concert hall, you can expect a rich, magnificent sound and a varied and captivating program. Frankfurt Radio Brass was founded in 2023 by five members of the hr Symphony Orchestra with the desire to present the audience not only with orchestral repertoire but also with the broad and brilliant spectrum of brass music at the highest level. From Baroque and Romantic to contemporary, there's something for everyone, because the musicians of Frankfurt Radio Brass have made it their mission to present every genre of music with the same passion, musicality, and technical perfection that listeners have come to expect from the hr Symphony Orchestra. The joy of making music together is always paramount and is visible and palpable to everyone.

Brass Connection

This season, the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra (hr-Sinfonieorchester Frankfurt) once again brings its chamber music concerts to the Forum Kultur Heppenheim. In the historic Kursaal, hr solo flautist Sebastian Wittiber and hr oboist Michael Höfele, accompanied by pianist Maria Ollikainen, will present French chamber music for flute, oboe, and English horn. The concert features a selection of distinctive works from the circle of the extraordinary composer Lili Boulanger, who at the age of 19 became the first woman to win the prestigious Prix de Rome and tragically died far too young just a few years later.

Chant du soir

Forum Kultur Heppenheim e. V.

As a conductor, he has the chance to "paint with a huge brush," says Nikolaj Szeps-Znaider. As a violinist, the brush is considerably smaller. Szeps-Znaider knows and can do both: He is one of the few who are equally successful as a violin soloist and conductor, often performing both roles in one evening – as in this concert with the hr Symphony Orchestra. "I was simply curious and only knew the diverse orchestral and operatic repertoire as a listener," explains the Copenhagen-born musician with Polish roots, justifying his dual career. "Ultimately, the repertoire for solo violinists was too narrow for me." And narrowness simply doesn't suit this artist's understanding of music, who is incredibly reflective and undogmatic, even when dealing with such well-known violin concertos as the popular one in G minor by Max Bruch. Questioning every note in relation to the whole is Szeps-Znaider's credo – "that's why playing it feels to me as if I'm discovering the piece for the very first time. It's never boring." Nikolaj Szeps-Znaider can be experienced as both violinist and conductor, performing two absolute classics – Bruch's Violin Concerto No. 1 and Dvořák's Symphony No. 7 – as well as a surprising orchestral work by the featured artist Unsuk Chin.

Dvořák 7

The Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra (hr-Sinfonieorchester Frankfurt) is a regular guest at the Wettenberg Winter Concerts, presenting its chamber music program. This time, musicians from the orchestra will perform a captivating string quartet program. Mozart's Viennese "Hoffmeister Quartet," with its unique blend of cheerfulness and melancholy, meets the colorful French quartet masterpiece of the young Ravel. Interspersed throughout this chamber concert, featuring members of the hr-Sinfonieorchester, are dazzling dance pieces by the German-Bohemian composer Erwin Schulhoff, ranging from waltzes and tangos to marches. Pure joy awaits all quartet enthusiasts on this enthralling evening!

Quartet delights

Evangelische Kirchengemeinde Wißmar

Three times Shostakovich, and three times a completely different facet: first in a thrillingly exhilarating orchestral overture, then in the powerfully fresh sonic shower of the Second Piano Concerto with its warm, jewel-like middle movement, and finally in the Fifth Symphony, which triumphs in an almost surreal way. Kahchun Wong, who in 2016 became the first Asian to win the prestigious Mahler Competition of the Bamberg Symphony, takes the podium of the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra for the first time. He will delve deep into Shostakovich's world, together with a pianist who knows his way around it like few others. "I'm addicted to Shostakovich's music, to this raw power," says Boris Giltburg, whose CD recording of the Shostakovich piano concertos is among the best currently available. What Giltburg observes for himself also defines the listening experience: "This is music that makes you tremble.