Die große Reihe – Staunen

Symphony concert by the Stuttgart Philharmonic Orchestra in the Liederhalle

WAGNER | Prelude and Liebestod from "Tristan und Isolde"
MOZART | Piano Concerto in A major KV 488
BACH/BANTOCK | "Awake, the voice calls to us"
HINDEMITH | Symphony "Mathis the Painter"

Yeol Eum Son, piano
Stuttgart Philharmonic Orchestra
Conductor: Andrey Boreyko

LONGING & TEMPTATION

Richard Wagner called "Tristan and Isolde" (1865) a "plot in three acts". Its instrumental prelude expresses Isolde's longing for her lover with harmonic combinations that were completely new at the time. Although the prelude is in the key of A minor, the A minor chord is never reached. Only Isolde's death in love, the final scene of "Tristan and Isolde", finds redemption from the agony of love in sweet harmonies.

K. 488 is one of only three piano concertos by Mozart in which clarinets play in the orchestra, giving them a very special timbre. It is a virtuoso, large-scale piece with a poignant middle movement.

The old hymn "Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme" is also about (spiritual) love and redemption. The British composer Granville Bantock created a colorful orchestration of one of Johann Sebastian Bach's best-known arrangements of the hymn. The symphony "Mathis der Maler" by Paul Hindemith was composed during work on the opera of the same name. Its plot deals with the role of the artist in society. The Renaissance master Matthias Grünewald is the main character, whose famous multi-part "Isenheim Altarpiece" in turn serves as inspiration for Hindemith's symphonic movements, with the "Angel Concerto" on an old song, the funeral music of the "Entombment" and the "Temptation of St. Anthony" as a dramatically exciting finale.

The symphony was premiered in March 1934 by the Berlin Philharmonic under the direction of Wilhelm Furtwängler to great public acclaim. In 1936, the Nazi government banned performances of Hindemith's works. Furtwängler, who had stood up for him, resigned from all his public offices. Hindemith went into exile in 1938.