Culture&Events

Lucerne Festival in Beijing 2009

(en.piao.com)
Updated: 2009-09-17 14:57

Lucerne Festival Orchestra When Claudio Abbado and Michael Haefliger founded the Lucerne Festival Orchestra, which has opened the summer season every year since 2003, they were, in a way, harking back to the birth of the Lucerne Festival in 1938. At that time, Arturo Toscanini first brought together an elite orchestra to play the legendary "Concert de Gala." With this model in mind, in 2009, renowned soloists will once again converge under the leadership of Claudio Abbado to work on and perform selected pieces from the symphonic repertoire. Performing as principals will be such musicians as violinists Kolja Blacher and Sebastian Breuninger; violists Wolfram Christ and Diemut Poppen; cellists Natalia Gutman, Jens Peter Maintz, and Clemens Hagen; and double bass player Alois Posch. Wind soloists will include flautist Jacques Zoon, clarinetist Joerg Widmann, horn player Bruno Schneider, and trumpeter Reinhold Friedrich. The core of the orchestra is drawn from the fifty members of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra. In addition to the Lucerne Festival Orchestra’s two large orchestral programs, the musicians will hold a number of chamber concerts. The Lucerne Festival Orchestra performed in Rome in the autumn of 2005, in Tokyo in October 2006, in New York's Carnegie Hall in 2007, and at the Vienna Musikverein in 2008. The next destination is Beijing: Claudio Abbado and his musicians have accepted an invitation to China for September 2009.

Mahler Chamber Orchestra The Mahler Chamber Orchestra (MCO) was founded in 1997 by former members of the Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra and is dedicated to repertoire that ranges from works for larger ensemble through the symphonic literature to classical opera and world premieres. A total of 42 musicians from 22 nations form the core of this independently financed orchestra, which can also be augmented with additional forces as needed. Along with cofounder Claudio Abbado, Daniel Harding has had a lasting influence on the orchestra's evolution, first as its principal guest conductor and then, as of 2003, as principal music director. Since 2008 he has been chief conductor.

The orchestra had its breakthrough to international acclaim as early as 1998 with a new production of Don Giovanni at the Aix-en-Provence Festival, conducted by Claudio Abbado. Eminent productions that ensued have included Britten's The Turn of the Screw (production by Luc Bondy) and of Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin (in the Irina Brook production), under the baton of Daniel Harding. Patrice Chéreau directed Mozart's Così fan tutte (2005) and Janá?ek's From the House of the Dead (2007) in productions that also appeared in Vienna and Amsterdam. The Mahler Chamber Orchestra gives two annual concert series in Ferrara, Italy.

Since 2003 the musicians of the MCO have performed as guest artists with the Lucerne Festival Orchestra, in addition to their own appearances as the MCO. Throughout its artistic development, the MCO has attracted renowned guest conductors and soloists, including Vladimir Ashkenazy, Philippe Herreweghe, Christopher Hogwood, and Paavo Jarvi as well as Martha Argerich, Emanuel Ax, Cecilia Bartoli, and Christian Tetzlaff.

Lucerne Festival debut: August 16, 2003 in works by Haydn, Kelterborn, and Schumann, with Daniel Harding conducting.