Events

Johann Sebastian Bach: Christmas Oratorio BWV 248
Parts (Cantatas) I-III

Maria Ladurner, soprano
Alois Mühlbacher, alto
Virgil Hartinger, tenor
Markus Volbert, bass
Collegium Vocale Salzburg
L’Orfeo Barockorchester
Michi Gaigg, conductor

Johann Sebastian Bach: Christmas Oratorio BWV 248
Parts (Cantatas) I-VI

Johanna Falkinger, soprano
Monika Schwabegger, alto
Daniel Johannsen, tenor
N.N., bass
L’Orfeo Barockorcher
H. Ewald Nathanael Donhoffer, direction

Franz Schubert: Arias and Romances from:
Adrast D 137 (1819-21), Die Zauberharfe D 644 (1820), Lazarus D 689 (1820),
Alfonso und Estrella D 732 (1821-22) and Fierabras D 796 (1823)
Symphony No. 2 in B flat major D 125 (1814-15)

Daniel Behle, tenor
L’Orfeo Barockorchester
Michi Gaigg, conductor

“To embark on this excursion with Behle’s wonderfully luminous and elegantly lavish tenor is like a journey through lush greenery and light-flooded summer freshness.” (BR Klassik) The programme sounds as poetic as this review – the titles of Schubert’s Singspiels and operas alone let the imagination run wild: “Die Zauberharfe”, “Alfonso and Estrella” or “Fierabras”. These enchanting gems of the opera repertoire have rarely been heard on German stages. And it is undoubtedly to the credit of Hamburg tenor Daniel Behle that he is bringing Schubert’s astonishingly extensive stage works, which with few exceptions were never performed even during his lifetime, back to life.

Johann Stamitz: Sinfonia I [in D major] from: Sei Sinfonie a piu istrumenti intitolate La Melodia Germanica Op. XI (1758)
Antonio Rosetti: Concerto in G a Oboe principale (c. 1780)
Anton Fils: Symphonia II [in G minor] from: Six Simphonies à quatre parties obligées Œuvre IIme (1760)
Franz Xaver Richter: Sinfonia IV [in D minor] from: Sei Sinfonie a più strumenti opera IIIa (1760)
Carl Stamitz: Simphonie concertante [in E flat major] à plusieurs instruments et exécutée au Concert spirituel
for violin, oboe, viola and bassoon solo (1775)
Ignaz Holzbauer: Sinfonia I [in E flat major] from: Six Simphonies à huit parties obligées Œuvre IIIe (1769)

Carin van Heerden & Philipp Wagner, oboe
Julia Huber-Warzecha, violin
Lucas Schurig-Breuß, viola
Makiko Kurabayashi, bassoon
L’Orfeo Barockorchester
Michi Gaigg, conductor

What would they have been, the masters of the Mannheim School – first and foremost Johann Stamitz as its founder, his sons Carl and Anton, the Kapellmeister of Viennese origin, Ignaz Holzbauer, who was appointed to him in 1753, the supposed outsider and lateral thinker Franz Xaver Richter or their congenial, early deceased comrade-in-arms Anton Fils, without the European musical capital of the time, Paris, and its lively and broad-based publishing scene? It was precisely these minds and their innovative musical creations that decisively shaped concert life there from the late 1750s to the 1780s – an outstanding position that was only to be disputed by the works of a certain Joseph Haydn.

Music by Leopold & Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Jakob Kajetan Hofbauer, T_ _ t_ _ us
Gabriel Federspieler, Mozart

Upper Austrian Dance Academy
Ilja van den Bosch, concept & choreography

L’Orfeo Barockorchester
Michi Gaigg, conductor

Wolfgang Amadé Mozart, that’s my favourite composer!!! Is he supposed to have been a child prodigy? He is said to have written well over 600 works? That would be one, two, three, oh dear, tens of millions of notes! Something can’t have gone right. This is one of the greatest mysteries in the history of music, I have to solve it! Maybe he simply copied from others … or even from himself? I’ll find out, again from the stage, of course.

Music by Leopold & Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Jakob Kajetan Hofbauer, T_ _ t_ _ us
Gabriel Federspieler, Mozart

Upper Austrian Dance Academy
Ilja van den Bosch, concept & choreography

L’Orfeo Barockorchester
Michi Gaigg, conductor

Wolfgang Amadé Mozart, that’s my favourite composer!!! Is he supposed to have been a child prodigy? He is said to have written well over 600 works? That would be one, two, three, oh dear, tens of millions of notes! Something can’t have gone right. This is one of the greatest mysteries in the history of music, I have to solve it! Maybe he simply copied from others … or even from himself? I’ll find out, again from the stage, of course.

Johann Sebastian Bach:
Orchestra Suite No. 2 in B minor BWV 1067
Cantata “Ich habe genung” BWV 82.2
Concerto in A major for Oboe d’amore, Strings and B.c. BWV 1055a
Cantata “Ich armer Mensch, ich Sündenknecht” BWV 55

Anders J. Dahlin, tenor
Marcello Gatti, traverso
Carin van Heerden, oboe d’amore
L’Orfeo Barockorchester
Michi Gaigg, direction

In 1723 Johann Sebastian Bach became cantor at the Thomas Church in Leipzig, a position he held for 27 years until his death in 1750. Bach’s foremost task was to provide music on a weekly basis for the city’s four churches. It was during this period that he composed all the great Passions, the four cantata cycles, the B minor Mass and a number of other church music masterpieces. L’Orfeo Barockorchester, directed by Michi Gaigg, performs two cantatas written in the years 1726–1727: “Ich armer Mensch, ich Sündenknecht”, BWV 55 and “Ich habe genung”, BWV 82. Bach didn’t only compose church music during this period though: in fact, he wrote instrumental music, orchestral works, solo concerts and chamber music during his whole lifetime. In addition to all his obligations in Leipzig he also directed the weekly concert series of the Collegium Musicum that performed to a paying audience. A substantial amount of instrumental music was composed for these occasions. L’Orfeo Barockorchester performs the second Orchestral Suite (BWV 1067) and his Concerto in A major for oboe d’amore (BWV 1055a), better known for its later arrangement for harpsichord.

George Frideric Handel:
Israel in Egypt HWV 54
Oratorio for soli, double choir and orchestra

Martina Daxböck, soprano
Katrin Auzinger, alto
Johannes Bamberger, tenor
Stefan Zenkl, bass
Lukas Kargl, bass

Domkantorei St. Pölten
cappella nova graz
L’Orfeo Barockorchester
Otto Kargl, direction

Since it was founded in 1992, Domkantorei St. Pölten has produced extremely successful renditions of early baroque church music and contemporary choral works. Now this specialist ensemble brings a masterpiece to the Festspielhaus: George Frideric Handel’s oratorio “Israel in Egypt”, whose fundamental message remains particularly relevant today for the Cathedral’s Music Director Otto Kargl: “Every person who is persecuted and oppressed, and whose life has been deprived of human dignity, has a claim to a promised land. That is the great message of this wonderful work.”

Franz Xaver Richter:
Sinfonia in G minor BoeR 29 „Sinfonia con fuga“ for 2 oboes, 2 horns & strings

Giovanni Benedetto Platti:
Concerto in G major for oboe, strings & bc

Franz Xaver Richter:
Sinfonia in B flat major BoeR deest for strings
Sinfonia in F major op. 4 No. 2 BoeR 32 for 2 oboes, 2 horns & strings

Johann Sebastian Bach:
Concerto in D minor BWV 1043 for 2 violins, strings and bc

Franz Xaver Richter:
Sinfonia in G major op. 4 No. 6 BoeR 25 for 2 oboes, 2 horns and strings

Carin van Heerden, oboe
Julia Huber-Warzecha & Martin Jopp, violin
L’Orfeo Barockorchester
Michi Gaigg, conductor

The 18th century was a time of transition (not only in musical terms, but especially pronounced there) – from the Baroque to the Classical period, from contrapuntal-vertical to harmonic-horizontal thinking, from (predominantly) courtly to increasingly bourgeois music, from chamber and church to salon and concert hall. Born in 1709 in the Moravian town of Hollauschau, Franz Xaver Richter was a member of the first generation of the so-called “Mannheim School”, both by birth and by age, but during his artistic career, which he ended as Kapellmeister at Strasbourg Cathedral, he was considered more conservative than progressive. This may have been due to his particular penchant for the elevated art of fugue, which was to manifest itself in a large number of his works, including not only those for the church, but also numerous sonatas, string quartets, solo concertos and over 80 symphonies. That counterpoint – in accordance with the values of the time – was regarded as one of the greatest and most enduring achievements of Western musical art becomes clear at the latest when we take a closer look at some of the compositional details in the works of Haydn, Mozart or Beethoven that were considered particularly elaborate. Richter’s “Sinfonia con Fuga” is in no way inferior to these. Rather, like its sister works, it bears witness to a mastery that is unparalleled in terms of tension and inner drama and here enters into an eloquent dialogue with the gallant figurations and rococo-like ornamentation of a concerto by the Padua-born oboe virtuoso Giovanni Platti. There is also a moment of mutual movement away from and towards each other between the two protagonists of Bach’s famous Double Concerto or the Richter symphonic movements that conclude the two concerto sections and from which the title of this programme with the L’Orfeo Barockorchester is composed.

George Frideric Handel:
Siroe, Re di Persia HWV 24

Opera in three acts
Libretto by Pietro Metastasio, arranged by Nicola Francesco Haym
First performance: London, Theater am Haymarket, 17 February 1728

Matthias Helm, baritone
Clint van der Linde, countertenor
Nicholas Hariades, countertenor
Amelie Müller, soprano
Annastina Malm, mezzosoprano
Philipp Kranjc, bass

L’Orfeo Barockorchester
Erich Traxler, musical direction
Kobie van Rensburg, direction, staging & video

In coproduction with donauFESTWOCHEN im Strudengau 2021

In 2019, the L’Orfeo Barockorchester was a guest at the Händel-Festspiele Halle for the last time: South African director Kobie van Rensburg brought the opera Atalanta by George Frideric Handel into the present using blue-screen technology and video animation, transporting the enthusiastic audience into imaginary worlds.
Three years later, Siroe, Re di Persia, a rarely heard work by the Halle-born master of baroque opera, now comes to the stage again in an innovative, multimedia form of Kobie van Rensburg’s production: betrayal, revenge, inheritance disputes and forbidden love at the Persian court – this explosive mixture is the theme of Pietro Metastasio’s libretto, which George Frideric Handel colourfully set to music for the Royal Academy of Music’s ninth season in 1728.

George Frideric Handel:
Siroe, Re di Persia HWV 24

Opera in three acts
Libretto by Pietro Metastasio, arranged by Nicola Francesco Haym
First performance: London, Theater am Haymarket, 17 February 1728

Matthias Helm, baritone
Clint van der Linde, countertenor
Nicholas Hariades, countertenor
Amelie Müller, soprano
Annastina Malm, mezzosoprano
Philipp Kranjc, bass

L’Orfeo Barockorchester
Erich Traxler, musical direction
Kobie van Rensburg, direction, staging & video

In coproduction with donauFESTWOCHEN im Strudengau 2021

In 2019, the L’Orfeo Barockorchester was a guest at the Händel-Festspiele Halle for the last time: South African director Kobie van Rensburg brought the opera Atalanta by George Frideric Handel into the present using blue-screen technology and video animation, transporting the enthusiastic audience into imaginary worlds.
Three years later, Siroe, Re di Persia, a rarely heard work by the Halle-born master of baroque opera, now comes to the stage again in an innovative, multimedia form of Kobie van Rensburg’s production: betrayal, revenge, inheritance disputes and forbidden love at the Persian court – this explosive mixture is the theme of Pietro Metastasio’s libretto, which George Frideric Handel colourfully set to music for the Royal Academy of Music’s ninth season in 1728.

Johann Sebastian Bach:
Orchestra Suite No. 1 in C major BWV 1066
Concerto in F major for harpsichord, 2 recorders, strings und b.c. BWV 1057
Concerto in A major for oboe d’amore, strings and b.c. BWV 1055a
Orchestra Suite No. 3 in D major BWV 1068 (reconstructed early version for 2 oboes, strings and b.c.)

Carin van Heerden, recorder & oboe d’amore
Alexander Gergelyfi, harpsichord
L’Orfeo Barockorchester
Michi Gaigg, violin & direction

Franz Schubert:
Sinfonie No. 7 in B minor D 759 „Unfinished“
Sinfonie No. 8 in C major D 944 „Great C major“

L’Orfeo Barockorchester
Michi Gaigg, Dirigentin

Franz Schubert:
Sinfonie No. 7 in B minor D 759 „Unfinished“
Sinfonie No. 8 in C major D 944 „Great C major“

L’Orfeo Barockorchester
Michi Gaigg, Dirigentin