Midori’s tour with the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande (February 2025)

Violinist and UN Messenger of Peace Midori is known for her global humanitarian work: At the end of 2024, Midori‘s foundation work took her to Nepal, where she was guest with her organization ICEP (International Community Engagement Program) with three young musicians. 2025 begins for Midori in Europe in February with a tour of Spain with the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande – after two send-off concerts in Geneva, the tour takes them to Madrid, Zaragoza, Barcelona, Las Palmas and Tenerife where Midori will present Sibelius’ Violin Concerto.

Further highlights in spring 2025 include duo recitals with pianist Özgür Aydin in North America in March, followed by Midori playing Detlev Glanert’s 2nd Violin Concerto To the Immortal Beloved in April, first in Nürnberg with the Staatsphilharmonie Nürnberg and then on a tour of Germany with the Bundesjugendorchester at Osterfestspiele Baden-Baden, Cologne, and Berlin, among others.

Further duo performances with Özgür Aydin in Rotterdam, Pamplona and Bilbao will follow later in the year in May, as well as a guest performance with the Deutsche Sinfonie-Orchester with Dvořák’s Violin Concerto in June at the Berlin Philharmonie.

midori-violin.com

Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra Recognized at Grammy Awards (February 2025)

The Grammy for ‘Best Engineered Album, Classical’ went to engineers Mark Donahue and John Newton for their recording of Bruckner’s Seventh Symphony and Mason Bates’s Resurrexit, performed by Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra under Manfred Honeck (Reference Recordings, 2024). The Grammy Awards took place on February 3, 2025.

Kent Nagano conducts premiere of Ariadne auf Naxos in Hamburg (January 2025)

All of three premieres take place under the baton of Kent Nagano in his last season at the Hamburg State Opera: the premiere of Strauss’ Ariadne auf Naxos in a production by Dmitri Tcherniakov, with whom Kent Nagano has already worked several times, and two commissions in May 2025: Unsuk Chin’s new opera The Dark Side of the Moon and Rodolphe Bruneau-Boulmier’s The Illusions of William Mallory.

In 2025, another highlight is the extensive project of Dresdner Musikfestspiele The Wagner Cycles, of which Kent Nagano is Artistic Director alongside Jan Vogler. After Richard Wagner’s Walküre in 2024, the next work of the opera tetralogy Siegfried will be performed historically informed and in concert performance in several international concert halls in 2025.

kentnagano.com

Max Volbers’ concert in February (January 2025)

In fall 2024, Max Volbers released his new album “Foreign Masters” with harpsichordist Alexander von Heißen on Berlin Classics. Max Volbers appeared on ZDF TV morning show with his new album – you can watch his performance with von Heißen here. At the beginning of January 2025, the album was nominated for the German Record Critics’ Award in the Early Music category. In 2023, Max Volber’s debut CD “Whispers of Tradition” was awarded the OPUS KLASSIK 2023 in the category Young Artist of the Year.

“Foreign Masters is a kaleidoscope of music by composers who came to London from abroad or whose music was enthusiastically played there. Immigration back then gave rise to an incredibly diverse musical heritage. London was a cultural capital of Europe whose extraordinary musical life would have been unthinkable without the artists from abroad and their lively exchange,” says Max Volbers about “Foreign Masters”.

Volbers and von Heißen presented the program of the CD in December in the Essen Philharmonie and on New Year’s Day in Weikersheim. Max Volbers’ concert on Christmas Day with Concerto Köln at Cologne Philharmonie was also a big success. Other highlights in 2024 were Max Volbers’ concerts with Il Pomo d’Oro in Antwerp and La Chaux-de-Fonds. In February 2025, he will play a concert with the Hamburg Camerata at the Laeiszhalle in Hamburg and with the Kore Orchestra in Warsaw.

maxvolbers.de

Jan Vogler’s Bach suites are all the rage – live in concert halls and online in Instagram reels

From baroque to Instagram vlogs: Johann Sebastian Bach‘s suites for solo cello are not only a hit in classical concert halls. Jan Vogler‘s recording of the prélude of Bach’s first suite for cello in G major has been used over 360,000 times (status 13.01.2025) by users for their reels on Instagram – making it currently by far the most successful Bach recording on the social media channel.

The topics and types of content that are combined with Bach’s famous composition in the digital world are as diverse as the 360,000 Instagram channels themselves. Whether in Asia, Europe or America, there are virtually no limits to its creative use. Bach’s music prevails and works as background music for content about designer fashion, babies, vacation vlogs, tutorials or animals, proving how timeless his music still is today.

Bach’s music is simple and complicated at the same time. It is so brilliantly composed that you get the impression that it clears your head and makes everything easy – so it gets you through your everyday life and conveys emotions, and yet it is incredibly ingeniously constructed. This combination is unique in the history of music,” says cellist Jan Vogler about the six cello suites by Johann Sebastian Bach.

The six cello suites are considered the supreme discipline for all cellists. Jan Vogler has spent his career intensively exploring the work and influence of Johann Sebastian Bach, recording and rediscovering the suites for SONY Classical in 2013 based on the manuscript by Bach’s wife Anna Magdalena and presenting them several times on the world’s major stages, including such prominent duo partners as US poet Amanda Gorman and Hollywood actor Bill Murray. In the Bach Year 2025, Jan Vogler will now bring all six suites to the stage in Germany and present them at the Elbphilharmonie Hamburg (March 8) and the Philharmonie Berlin (April 26).

March 4, 2025 Schloss Elmau, 5 pm (Suite 1-3)

March 6, 2025 Schloss Elmau, 5 pm (Suite 4-6)

March 8, 2025 Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, Großer Saal, 11 am (Suite 1-6)

April 26, 2025 Philharmonie Berlin, Kammermusiksaal, 7 pm (Suite 1-6)

www.janvogler.com

For a higher resolution of the image material, please contact office@pr2classic.de.

Mari Kodama (January 2025)

At the end of 2024, Mari Kodama released a nuanced Bruckner portrait with rarely recorded piano works on Pentatone which has received a great amount of international attention (Mari Kodama’s discography).

Mari Kodama‘s season 2024/25 included an opening concert with Le Cercle de l’Harmonie in Paris (Jérémie Rhorer) with Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 1 on the fortepiano as well as concerts with the Würth Philharmonic Orchestra (with Veronika Eberle and Jan Vogler under the direction of Kent Nagano) and the Filarmonica de Stat Transilvania (Larry Forster). Mari Kodama also gave a duo recital with Julian Prégardien and in June 2025 she will return to the Konzerthaus Blaibach to continue her series with all 32 Beethoven piano sonatas and new works by Rodolphe Bruneau-Boulmier.

marikodama.com

Jan Vogler presents Bach Cello Suites in Hamburg and Berlin (January 2025)

A highlight of cellist and intendant of the Dresdener Musikfestspiele Jan Vogler in 2024 was a special concert he presented with US poet Amanda Gorman. Together they created a concert evening with Bach’s cello suites matching Gorman’s poetry which was presented in 2024 at Carnegie Hall in New York City and later that year on Stephen Colbert’s Late Night Show. The label Capriccio also released Miloslav Kabeláč’s complete chamber music oeuvre on CD for the first time, with the participation of Jan Vogler.

In January 2025, Jan Vogler will be a guest at the Classicameri Festival in Eilat, Israel, of which Omer Meir Wellber is Artistic Director. Following his focus on Bach in 2024, Jan Vogler will present two special solo concerts in March and April 2025 in Germany: on March 8 at the Elbphilharmonie Hamburg and on April 26 at the Berlin Philharmonie, Jan Vogler will play all six of Bach’s cello suites. Performances with the NHK Symphony Orchestra, Berlin Philharmonic Brass and the Stuttgart Philharmonic Orchestra will follow in May.

janvogler.com

Omer Meir Wellber conducts his creation “KaiserRequiem” at Volksoper Wien (January 2024)

Omer Meir Wellber concludes his time as music director at the Teatro Massio in Palermo with the New Year’s Concert. However, he will return to the house as a guest conductor in April and May to conduct a new production of Strauss’ Salome.

On January 25, 2025, a new production of the KaiserRequiem will premiere at the Vienna Volksoper, his own creation of Mozart’s Requiem and Viktor Ullmann’s The Emperor of Atlantis, with the Vienna State Ballet (choreography and direction Andreas Heise). In 2024, Omer Meir Wellber conducted a very special world premiere at the Volksoper: the new opera by composer Ella Milch-Sheriff ALMA which was a big success. In May, the KaiserRequiem will be presented in a semi-staged performance at the Philharmonie de Paris under the direction of Omer Meir Wellber with the Orchestre de Paris.

The spring will take Omer Meir Wellber first to London to the London Philharmonic Orchestra, and then to Leipzig to the Gewandhaus Orchestra. From September 2025, he will begin his first season as General Music Director and Chief Conductor of the Hamburg State Opera and Hamburg General Music Director of the Philharmonic State Orchestra.

omermeirwellber.com

Max Volbers: Foreign Masters nominated for German Record Critic’s Award (January 2025)

The new CD by recorder player Max Volbers, Foreign Masters, has been nominated for the German Record Critics’ Award. On Foreign Masters, Max Volbers, together with Alexander von Heißen (harpsichord), sheds light on the diverse international influences that shaped the London music scene of the 18th century. The album, released by Berlin Classics, has been nominated in the Early Music category (longlist 01/25).

More information can be found at schallplattenkritik.de and maxvolbers.de

Omer Meir Wellber with a special New Year’s concert at the Teatro Massimo (December 2024)

For Omer Meir Wellber, the new year begins with a very special program at the Teatro Massimo in Palermo. Together with Guy Mintus and the orchestra and choir of the Teatro Massimo, he presents a concert program that combines Mendelssohn’s Italian Symphony with improvisations on Neapolitan songs.

1 January 2025, 6 pm | Sala Grande, Teatro Massimo
Omer Meir Wellber – conductor and accordion
Guy Mintus – piano and orchestrations
Orchestra and choir of the Teatro Massimo
Felix Mendelssohn: Symphony No. 4 in A major op. 90 (arrangement by Guy Mintus with improvisations on Neapolitan songs)

Further information on the evening’s program at teatromassimo.it

GDPR Cookie Consent with Real Cookie Banner