"Spielfreude" - 2025/2026
Whenever I sit in the audience on our international concert tours and watch the musicians of our and watch the musicians of our orchestra at work, I am always asked about the obvious the obvious joy of playing that our orchestra radiates. The second violins smile the second violins smile at each other in the cantilenas, the solo viola player smiles even even in complicated parts, the trumpets are not only radiant in sound, but all over their faces and Jakub Hrůša really enjoys the whole thing anyway. And at the end, after the final applause and the encore, the musicians hug each other amicably as they say goodbye. to say goodbye. A murmur always goes through the audience - many have never seen it like this before. never seen before - as orchestral playing is otherwise often performed in a very serious and performed. Our Bamberg Symphony Orchestra, however, shows its joy in playing together openly and enthusiastically. This was the reason for us to season under the motto SPIELFREUDE and, above all, to shine a new light on the 112 fabulous musicians musicians who make every one of our concerts a worldwide event.
You, dear reader, will not only find this playfully expressed in the cover picture of the brochure but also portrayed photographically throughout.
However, the orchestra's joy of playing would be inconceivable without the inspiration, humor and passion of the respective “leaders”: Principal Conductor Jakub Hrůša, our honorary conductors Herbert Blomstedt, Christoph Eschenbach and Manfred Honeck as well as the numerous guest artists who are assisting us this season. They bring their joy of playing in special program constellations that playfully deal with the concert format. with the concert format, involving many of our orchestral soloists and even the overture at the end of the concert, all carefully, musically meaningful and yet playful. and yet playfully arranged. There is also a wide range of works, hidden in the title or in the notes, be it as a humorous setting of sporting as a humorous setting of sporting games, as a reminiscence of opera stories such as Tchaikovsky's “Queen of Spades” or musical children's games such as Bizet's “Jeux d'enfants”. There is all this and much more to discover this season - stay tuned!
The joy of playing is particularly great on anniversaries: right at the beginning, on the 250th birthday of Johann Strauss, Manfred Honeck will introduce us to the Viennese joy of playing waltzes, polkas & co. In March 2026, the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra will celebrate its own milestone birthday: it will be 80 years old and, with its Prague roots, is well on the way to almost 250 years of Bohemian musical tradition. To mark the 80th, we are giving our audience a special gala with the winners of the International Classical Music Awards.
Before our joy of playing meets the Mahler Competition's joy of conducting in June 2026, fans of the Bamberg Symphony in Spain, Austria and Italy, in Hamburg, Cologne and Munich and many other places will also have the opportunity to listen to us play joyfully. Enjoy the concert, wherever you will experience us!
Marcus Rudolf Axt
President and CEO
Please find our season brochure here.