Sol Gabetta plays Elgar

Abo E
Bamberg, Konzerthalle, Joseph-Keilberth-Saal
17:00 Uhr

Michelangelo held that “art draws its most sublime inspiration from suffering”. This intoxicating concert will take us to undreamt-of regions with works that were created as parables for a ravaged world and ominous times. Our programme starts with the hypnotic music of American composer George Crumb. His ethereal "God-Music" is taken from the string quartet "Black Angels”, which he composed in 1970 in response to the Vietnam War. In it, an electrically amplified cello is accompanied by crystal glasses, creating an otherworldly effect. Britten likewise conceived his Sinfonia da Requiem of 1940 as a mass for the dead and an anti-war statement – a confessional work with a Christian programme and a prevailing mood of tragedy that requires the orchestra to muster elemental forces. When Elgar wrote his famous Cello Concerto in 1919, he was mourning the end that World War I had put to a seemingly perfect world. The result is a poignantly melancholy piece whose highly emotional lyricism cellist Jacqueline du Pré once described as "the distillation of a tear”. Wagner's opera drama “Tristan und Isolde”, which premiered in 1865, delves into deep psychological tensions, joy and sorrow, love and death: a night of passion seals Tristan and Isolde’s fate. In Wagner’s own words, the prelude mirrors the “inner movement of the soul”. In our performance, this heady music will flow straight into an equally powerful monumental tone painting by a musical eccentric: in 1908, Scriabin used stupendous orchestral effects to create a veritable ecstasy of sound, into which a quotation from a socialist revolutionary song is interwoven, giving euphoric expression to the uprising of the oppressed masses.

Patrick Hahn Conductor
Sol Gabetta Violoncello

George Crumb »God-Music« aus »Black Angels«
Benjamin Britten Sinfonia da requiem op. 20
Edward Elgar Konzert für Violoncello und Orchester e-Moll op. 85
Richard Wagner Tristan und Isolde - Vorspiel 1. Aufzug
Alexander Skrjabin »Le Poème de l‘extase« op. 54