Omer Meir Wellber began his tenure as Music Director of the Volksoper Wien on 1 September. With Jolanthe and the Nutcracker, a musical theater based on the opera and ballet by Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Wellber will present his first new production at the house on 9 October, together with the Artistic Director Lotte de Beer directing. Prior to this premiere, he conducts his symphonic debut with the Volksoper Orchestra and violinist Midori at the Vienna Konzerthaus on 13 September and his first opera performance at the Volksoper with Mozart’s Magic Flute on 14 September.
Omer Meir Wellber’s novel was published in French by Éditions du sous-sol in August, Les Absences de Haïm Birkner tells the story of Chaim Birkner, a tired and broken man who is forced by his daughter to face life one last time. The novel was also published in German (BerlinVerlag) and in Italian (Sellerio Editore).
Tonight’s concert on June 29 will be broadcast next Friday, July 1, starting at 8:05 p.m. on MDR Kultur & MDR Klassik. Further information can be found here.
Interesting details about the concert program as well as artists can be found in the digital program booklet here.
With the CD release The Mandolin Seasons, Omer Meir Wellber and mandolinist Jacob Reuven fulfill a long-held wish.
Jacob Reuven and Omer Meir Wellber grew up together in the Israeli desert city of Be’er Sheva – Reuven with Iraqi Jewish roots and Wellber coming from a western Jewish community. United since childhood by an irrepressible joie de vivre, they have a shared passion for music and, more specifically, for the instruments of their homeland, learned as schoolboys: mandolin and accordion… (more in the booklet)
And it is with these instruments that the two musicians together with the Sinfonietta Leipzig (musicians of the Gewandhausorchester) completely rediscover the seasons of Vivaldi and Piazzolla in The Mandolin Seasons.
With Omer Meir Wellber in the role of conductor and continuo player on harpsichord and accordion – meaning he is improvising in both “Seasons” – and Jacob Reuven’s desire to reshape the works for mandolin, both explore and create a new exotic sound world with it.
The recording will be released by Hyperion on 6 May.
Jacob Reuven– mandolin Omer Meir Wellber – accordion, harpsichord, conductor Sinfonietta LeipzigVivaldi: Violin Concerto in F minor “Winter” RV297 Piazzolla: Invierno porteño (No. 2, “Winter for the people of Buenos Aires” from Las cuatro estaciones porteñas) Vivaldi: Violin concerto in E major “Spring” RV269 Piazzolla: Primavera porteña (No. 3, “Springtime for the people of Buenos Aires“) Vivaldi: Violin Concerto in G minor “Summer” RV315 Piazzolla: Verano porteño (No. 4, “Summer for the people of Buenos Aires“) Vivaldi: Violin concerto in F major “Autumn” RV293 Piazzolla: Otoño porteño (No. 1, “Autumn for the people of Buenos Aires“)
On 15 April, Omer Meir Wellber will be awarded the Rudi Häussler Prize in the course of the performance of Don Giovanni. Omer Meir Wellber was already awarded the prize in 2020, but due to the pandemic the award ceremony could not take place until this year.
With this prize, the Stiftung Semperoper honours artistic personalities who have contributed to the reputation of the Semperoper Dresden. The main aim is to promote artists with “extraordinary ambitions and talents” and Omer Meir Wellber “manages like no other to turn conducting into special experiences for the audience”, according to the founder of the foundation, Senator h. c. Rudi Häussler.
The BBC celebrates its centenary in 2022 and Omer Meir Wellber will join the BBC Philharmonic and pianist Giulia Contaldo for this weekend’s festivities. More information about the concert can be found here.
In two days, Omer Meir Wellber will conduct the new production of Verdi’s Les Vêpres siciliennes, staged by Emma Dante, at the Teatro Massimo in Palermo which will be streamed live on ARTE Concert on 20 January at 7 p.m. CET.
Omer Meir Wellber started the new year 2022 with a special concert at the Teatro Massimo with Erwin Schrott and the Teatro’s chorus and orchestra. He performed some pieces with an accordion built especially for him by the renowned Italian company Pigini.
He will return to Dresden at the Semperoper in March and April with revivals of Don Giovanni, Cosi fan tutte and Le Nozze di Figaro, as well as a new production of Madama Butterfly (Amon Miyamoto, staging).
Omer Meir Wellber presents a special program in Hamburg and Lübeck together with the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester. Ella Milch Sheriff’s monodrama Der ewige Fremde was premiered in February 2020 at the Gewandhaus zu Leipzig with the same protagonists as here in Hamburg and Lübeck. You can find more information about the work here.
The concert will be broadcast live 19 December at 11 a.m. on NDR Kultur.
16, 19 December Hamburg, Elbphilharmonie
NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra
Britten: Violin Concerto in D minor, Op. 15
Milch-Scheriff: Der ewige Fremde
Beethoven: Symphony No. 4 B flat major Op. 60
Augustin Hadelich – violin, Eli Danker – speaker
17 December Lübeck, Music and Congress Hall
NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra
Britten: Violin Concerto in D minor Op. 15
Milch-Scheriff: Der ewige Fremde
Beethoven: Symphony No. 4 B flat major Op. 60
Augustin Hadelich – violin, Eli Danker – speaker
Omer Meir Wellber’s novel was published in French by Éditions du sous-sol in August, 