Upwards

Introduction 50 minutes before the concert in the concert hall.

Psalms? Symphony? Well, what is it exactly? Igor Stravinsky goes his own way, once again. A conductor commissions something festive for a jubilee; the publisher wishes for something  popular. That obviously calls for Biblical texts. In three psalms we tread a path together with the Bürgerchor from plangent misery to angelic jubilation. Meaning from the depths toward celestial spheres—and without any high strings. The stomping rhythms so typical of Stravinsky are of course nonetheless included

Gustav Mahler mixes dangerously emotional cocktails. One is already hooked after just one sip—and yet with Mahler you often don’t know where you stand. If at first you think you are picking up on a naive children’s ditty: just two bars later, you’re pulled over the edge into a deep abyss. Abrupt resignation has hardly set in when this composer shows up with the next cheerful melody, as if nothing had happened. But this roller coaster ride of feelings also finds its way to paradise. One that soprano Siobhan Stagg will sell to us as a veritable treasure trove: »The angels bake the bread.«