Edward Elgar: Cello Concerto in E minor, Op. 85
Joseph Haydn: Symphony No. 92 in G major, Hob. I:92, “Oxford”
***
Joseph Haydn: Symphony No. 100 in G major, Hob. I:100, ”Military”
The opening concert of the
Festival Maribor will be marked by the Festival's resident orchestra, members of the international
Haydn Philharmonic, based in Eisenstadt, and musical reinforcement by outstanding Slovenian musicians. The orchestra will perform under the baton of the artistic director and central figure of Maribor Festival 2018, the cellist and conductor
Nicolas Altstaedt.
All who witnessed last year's opening concert know how well the
Haydn Philharmonic embodies the passion for music under the direction of its charismatic conductor. That is precisely why this year's Festival Maribor is dedicated to the passion and spirit, which both lie at the heart of the Festival's musicianship.
As this year's concert programme features works of the great English musician Edward Elgar and the symphonies composed in London by Joseph Haydn, one could easily subtitle it as the ʺEnglish concertʺ, and thus provoke a sceptical question: What does the proverbial English reserve have to do with passion?
This is exactly where our musicians will bring forth the real, truly deep passion to be found in the hearts of musicians and not in superficial cultural clichés. And as regards the English reserve, let us remove its veil of manners in order to disclose that such music could never have been created without internal need and passion. Elgar ingeniously channelled the pulse in his people's veins into musical works. Beneath every elegantly inscribed page, amiable melody and apparent light-heartedness simmers a lust for life, like liquid lava under the sleepy surface of the green English landscape.
Speaking of passion, ʺPapaʺ Haydn's livelier younger years – a time marked by joviality and an unbridled interest in everything worldly (including unrestrained enjoyment of women’s company despite a supposedly happy marriage) – will also not be forgotten. His ʺfatherlyʺ reputation was established only later in life. This vivacity never left Haydn; an astute ear will recognize it in each one of his works.
So abandon your prejudices and restraint at home and join us at yet another dazzling opening of the
Festival Maribor!
"What a review of life: in the recitative of a broken man, scurrying memories and elf-like fantasy worlds up to the elegiac farewell. Between Wagnerian chromatisms and the palpitations of the heart of a timpani beat like Brahms' Requiem, all colours of life shimmer in intensified memory as if through a revolving crystal ball. After death oblivion remains, Elgar said; it is his last important work, after the First World War he found his last words here.
120 years before Elgar was composing at Brinkwells, England and the thunder of French artillery was heard in Sussex over the English Channel, Joseph Haydn met refugees of the French Revolution in London. If both artistic achievements are marked by the suffering of innumerable people, today we are made aware of the preciousness of every single moment of life."
Nicolas Altstaedt
*
Tickets: 25 € / Pre-sale 20 € / Senior 20 € / Students, Disability 12,50 €
Discounted tickets can be purchased at the Information office of Narodni dom Maribor or at the concert venue up to an hour before the concert.
