Ainārs Rubiķis and Viviane Hagner

Fri, 17 Sep 2021, 20:00

Conductor Tarmo Peltokoski
Soloist Iiro Rantala, piano

Iiro Rantala Intro for piano solo
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Concerto for Piano and Orchestra No. 21 in C major KV 467
Iiro Rantala Freedom and Anyone with a heart
Jean Sibelius Lemminkäinen’s Return op. 22
Finlandia, Symphonic Poem op. 29
Iiro Rantala Tears for Esbjörn, Final Fantasy and The Best of Beethoven
Wild, Fun, and Finnish! - With his 21-year-old compatriot Tarmo Peltokoski on the podium, Finnish pianist and composer Iiro Rantala—renowned in jazz circles—presents a programme as varied as it is humorous: With Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 21, two symphonic poems by the Finn Jean Sibelius and many compositions by Iiro Rantala. A thoroughly Finnish evening—where laughter is also welcome!

Fri, 8 Oct 2021, 20:00

Conductor Ainārs Rubiķis
Soloist Tzimon Barto, piano

Claude Debussy La Cathédrale engloutie
Sergei V. Rachmaninov Concerto for Piano and Orchestra No. 2 op. 18 in C minor
Arthur Honegger Pastorale d'été
Alexander N. Scriabin Le Poème de l'extase op. 54

From dark depths to cosmic heights!—General Music Director Ainārs Rubiķis and pianist Tzimon Barto perform the explosive power of poetic timbres: from Debussy's Sunken Cathedral to the bell-like chords in Rachmaninoff's second piano concerto, the fresh feeling of a morning in the Swiss Alps in the atmospheric music of Arthur Honegger, to the cosmic expanses of Alexander N. Scriabin's Poème de l'extase. In this concert with the Komische Oper Berlin Orchestra, poetic landscapes come alive and the many facets of these irrepressible works shine.

Fri, 12 Nov 2021, 20:00

Conductor Ainārs Rubiķis
Soloist Viviane Hagner, violin

Sergei S. Prokofiev Rêves (»Dreams«), Symphonic Poem op. 6
Benjamin Britten Concerto for Violin and Orchestra in D minor op. 15
Dmitri D. Shostakovich Symphony No. 5 in D minor op. 47

From Dreams to Light—Music Director Ainārs Rubiķis brings works by three giants of 20th century music to the stage: Framed by Prokofiev's early orchestral piece Dreams and Shostakovich's artistic confrontation with the Stalin era, his allusive Symphony No. 5, Benjamin Britten's Concerto for Violin and Orchestra will be performed. One of the most demanding works for solo violin and long considered »unplayable«, internationally renowned violinist Viviane Hagner rises to the challenge.

Sat, 1 Jan. 2022, 16:00

Conductor Ainārs Rubiķis

With singers from the Ensemble and the Orchestra of the Komische Oper Berlin.
Ever since "the pictures learned to walk", the medium of film has inspired composers of very different origins to artistic creation. For this year's New Year's Concert, General Music Director Ainārs Rubiķis has not chosen the usual soundtracks created for the Hollywood dream factory, but instead offers familiar and yet-to-be-discovered works from the pens of composers such as Arthur Honegger, Sergei S. Prokofiev, Alfred Schnittke, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Erich Wolfgang Korngold and Nino Rota. And, action!

Fri, 28 Jan 2022, 20:00
Ainārs Rubiķis and Ksenija Sidorova

Conductor Ainārs Rubiķis
Soloist Ksenija Sidorova, accordion

Béla Bartók The Miraculous Mandarin op. 19
Artem Nyzhnyk Mactoub Partita No. 2
Pyotr I. Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 6 in B minor op. 74 Pathétique

Anything but ordinary!—Long admired as an example of the musical avant-garde, Béla Bartók's music for dance pantomime The Miraculous Mandarin caused a scandal in Cologne in 1926; Mayor Konrad Adenauer even temporarily banned performance of the work. The same spirit of the musical avant-garde animates the Ukrainian composer and bayan player Artem Nyzhnyk’s four-part Partita No. 2 Mactoub from 2011. The solo accordion, with its sound between late Romanticism and minimal music, is central to this work, with Latvian star accordionist Ksenija Sidorova interpreting this highly complex part. Pyotr I. Tchaikovsky considered his 6th symphony to be his most important work, but at the time, it aroused little enthusiasm. Today, the Pathétique enchants concert audiences and ensures its creator's immortality anew.

Fri, 18 Feb 2022, 20:00
Axel Kober and Daniel Müller-Schott

Conductor Axel Kober
Soloist Daniel Müller-Schott, violoncello

Antonín Dvořák Concerto for Violoncello and Orchestra in B minor op. 104
Alexander Zemlinsky The Mermaid, Fantasy in three movements, based on a fairy tale by Andersen

Pure Romanticism!—The classic of the romantic solo concerto penned by Antonín Dvořák is followed by a lesser-known work which is based on a world-famous fairy tale: Alexander von Zemlinsky's fantasy in three parts The Mermaid retells Hans Christian Andersen's famous fairy tale of the tragically enamoured water maiden, through late Romantic orchestral sounds. The world-renowned cellist Daniel Müller-Schott, described by the New York Times as a »fearless player with outstanding technique«, performs with the Orchestra of the Komische Oper Berlin under the baton of the General Music Director of the Deutsche Oper am Rhein, Axel Kober, acclaimed at the prestigious Bayreuther Festspiele.

Fri, 18 March 2022, 20:00
Xian Zhang and Tine Thing Helseth

Conductor Xian Zhang
Soloist Tine Thing Helseth, trumpet

Ferdinand Ries Overture to Schiller's tragedy The Bride of Messina op. 162
Johann Nepomuk Hummel Concerto for Trumpet and Orchestra in E flat major
Robert Schumann Symphony No. 1 in B flat major op. 38 Spring Symphony

Emerging from Beethoven’s Shadow!—Chinese-American conductor Xian Zhang is critically acclaimed worldwide for her conducting, which is as precise as it is sensitive. She turns to a remarkably theatrical work with Ferdinand Ries's overture to Schiller's tragedy The Bride of Messina, which spent a long time, unjustly, in the shadow of Beethoven. With Johann Nepomuk Hummel's Concerto for Trumpet and Orchestra in E flat major, the Norwegian trumpeter Tine Thing Helseth takes on an outright classic at the crossover to musical Romanticism. It is also the trumpet that blares a mighty »Yes!« to the world and to life, right at the beginning of Robert Schumann's Spring Symphony. A compositional highlight in the work of this exceptional artist— Sound the trumpet!

Sun, 27 March 2022, 11:00

A surprise programme with soloists from the Opera Studio and the Orchestra of the Komische Oper Berlin

Fri, 6 May 2022, 20:00
Joshua Weilerstein and Daniel Hope

Conductor Joshua Weilerstein
Soloist Daniel Hope, violin

Bernard Herrmann Vertigo Suite
Alfred Schnittke Concerto for Violin and Orchestra No. 1
Pyotr I. Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 5 in E minor op. 64

The Music of Fate!—Bernard Herrmann's film score for Alfred Hitchcock's 1958 classic Vertigo and Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 5, first performed in 1888, seem worlds apart. And yet both scores are dominated by the recurring motif of fate. And both Tchaikovsky, who shaped Russian music of the 19th century like no other, and Herrmann, the influential American film composer with Russian roots, show themselves to be influenced by the music of Richard Wagner on closer inspection. After all, Herrmann, like Tchaikovsky, was a romantic at heart. With the 1957 1st Violin Concerto by the Volga German Alfred Schnittke, whose oeuvre also includes numerous remarkable film scores, star violinist Daniel Hope builds a bridge between Tchaikovsky and Herrmann in a concert which simultaneously bridges the gap between Romanticism and Modernism.

Fri, 17 June 2022, 20:00

Conductor Ainārs Rubiķis
Soloist Baiba Skride, violin

Rodion K. Shchedrin Concerto for Orchestra No. 1 Naughty Limericks
Karol Szymanowski Concerto for Violin and Orchestra No. 1 op. 35
Sergei V. Rachmaninov Symphony No. 2 in E minor op. 27


Masterpieces: Romantic, Opulent—and Cheeky! Rodion K. Shchedrin's Concerto for Orchestra No. 1 Naughty Limericks makes generous use of Russian folk music and folklore, woven together as a mix of humorous episodes in the guise of classical and romantic sounds, quite simply: cheeky hits.
These are followed by the 1st Violin Concerto by the Polish composer Karol Szymanowski, an extraordinarily refined work, iridescent in all colours of chromatic richness and interpreted by the internationally renowned violinist Baiba Skride from Latvia. Under the baton of General Music Director Ainārs Rubiķis, the orchestra of the Komische Oper Berlin will conclude the concert with the sublimely constructed 2nd Symphony by the Russian, late Romantic depth analyst of human existence, Sergei V. Rachmaninov.