UNERHÖRT: The new HfMDK CD!

What unites the mas­terful ch­an­ges in style and sound, Stra­vin­s­ky's bru­te rhythm and Tchai­kovs­ky's ele­gant me­lo­dies to crea­te this fa­sci­na­ting and mo­ving lis­tening ex­pe­ri­ence? Con­duc­tor Vas­si­lis Chris­to­pou­los and con­cert­mas­ter Fe­li­ci­tas Schiff­ner agree: "The rich­ness of co­lors, the pas­si­on, it com­ple­te­ly grip­ped us. And the sty­listic va­rie­ty, which re­mains so un­mist­aka­b­ly Rus­si­an in the most di­ver­se ways!"

The new CD with or­ches­tral works by Stra­vin­sky and Tchai­kovs­ky, the so­loist Utku Asan (pia­no) and the or­chestra of the HfMDK un­der the di­rec­tion of Vas­si­lis Chris­to­pou­los can be purcha­sed on­line for a no­mi­nal fee of 5.- Euro.

For the first time, not a con­cert re­cor­ding, but a pro­fes­sio­nal pro­duc­tion at a his­to­ri­cal­ly si­gni­fi­cant lo­ca­ti­on: con­duc­ting pro­fes­sor Vas­si­lis Chris­to­pou­los finds a crea­ti­ve ans­wer to the pan­de­mic rest­ric­tions. In the uni­ver­si­ty­'s Gre­at Hall, built in 1930 as a re­cor­ding stu­dio for the then Sou­thwest Ra­dio in the style of Frank­fur­t's mo­der­nism, he con­ti­nues the tra­di­ti­on the re­cor­dings made the­re in the past. The unu­sual­ly lar­ge di­stance bet­ween the mu­si­ci­ans, which makes it dif­fi­cult to play tog­e­ther, is not au­di­ble in the re­cor­ding - thanks to the gre­at per­for­mance of the uni­ver­si­ty or­chestra and the th­ree sound en­gi­neers. "Tchai­kovs­ky was of all of us the most Rus­si­an," jud­ged his col­le­a­gue Stra­vin­sky, who was a good 40 ye­ars younger. And De­bus­sy, in turn, said of Stra­vin­sky in 1916: "He is a young sa­va­ge. In old age he will be un­be­ara­ble. But at the mo­ment he is un­he­ard of".

What makes one com­po­ser quint­es­sen­ti­al­ly Rus­si­an, and the other un­he­ard-of? Both have Rus­si­an roots, both sought ex­ch­an­ge with the mu­si­cal world in the West.

Stra­vin­sky – in­no­va­tor of mo­der­nism and com­po­ser of the avant-gar­de – gl­ad­ly and of­ten took up the most di­ver­se styl­es of mu­sic histo­ry. His see­mingly ar­chaic wind sym­pho­nies im­press with their stran­ge­ly ri­gid, ri­tua­listic mu­sic. The Con­cer­to for Pia­no and Wind In­stru­ments is a work of sur­pri­ses and breaks: sty­listi­cal­ly, har­mo­ni­cal­ly, rhyth­mi­cal­ly. Ba­ro­que ele­ments in the first mo­ve­ment al­ter­na­te with ly­ri­cal-ro­man­tic ones in the se­cond, re­mi­nis­cent of Brahms, up to the French-like third mo­ve­ment: playful, ele­gant, sen­su­al. An ex­tre­me­ly vir­tuo­sic work for the pia­nist! "Utku Asan shows a mas­te­ry, tech­ni­cal­ly and mu­si­cal­ly," Chris­to­pou­los said.

Tchai­kovs­ky's mu­si­cal lan­guage is Eu­ro­pean, late Ro­man­tic with an un­mist­aka­b­ly Rus­si­an cha­rac­ter. In his Se­re­na­de for String Or­chestra, the sty­listic con­trast is par­ti­cu­lar­ly pal­pa­ble and ap­pe­al­ing: the (pre-clas­si­cal) swee­ping first mo­ve­ment, the cheerful, po­pu­lar waltz, the Ro­man­tic-le­gen­da­ry third mo­ve­ment, and the fie­ry-tem­pe­red fi­nal mo­ve­ment with Rus­si­an co­lor. De­spi­te the dif­fi­cul­ty, it is not by chan­ce one of the most po­pu­lar com­po­si­ti­ons of all string or­chestras.

It is a spe­cial en­sem­ble, the or­chestra of the HfMDK. Be­cau­se the mem­bers ch­an­ge so re­gu­lar­ly: Wi­thin the frame­work of the ar­tis­tic in­stru­men­tal stu­dies, stu­dents come tog­e­ther aga­in and aga­in to form a ho­mo­ge­neous, pro­fes­sio­nal body of sound. They learn to play tog­e­ther and de­ve­lop a sty­listi­cal­ly broad re­per­toire. At the end of a work pha­se the­re is usual­ly a con­cert or a re­cor­ding. The or­chestra also re­gu­lar­ly gi­ves guest per­for­man­ces out­side the uni­ver­si­ty, for ex­am­p­le in the broad­cas­ting hall of the Hes­si­scher Rund­funk, in the Hei­lig-Geist-Kir­che in Frank­furt or in the Ba­si­li­ka Klos­ter Eber­bach at the Rhein­gau Mu­sic Fes­ti­val.

Vas­si­lis Chris­to­pou­los has been re­spon­si­ble for or­ches­tral trai­ning at the HfMDK as Pro­fes­sor of Con­duc­ting sin­ce 2016. He has in­itia­ted new edu­ca­tio­nal con­cepts for or­ches­tral play­ing and con­duc­ting as well as es­tab­lished na­tio­nal and in­ter­na­tio­nal net­works – im­pres­si­ve­ly ex­pan­ding edu­ca­tio­nal op­por­tu­ni­ties for stu­dents. Chris­to­pou­los is Greek, but was born in Mu­nich. He stu­di­ed in Athens and Mu­nich. A wan­de­rer bet­ween cul­tures, he now per­forms with re­now­ned or­chestras at home and ab­road. In Oc­to­ber 2017, for ex­am­p­le, he opened the Greek Na­tio­nal Ope­ra's new ve­nue with a mu­si­cal thea­ter work by a Ger­man com­po­ser set in Greece: "Elek­tra" by Ri­chard Strauss.

In the 1930s, Paul Hin­de­mith tra­ve­led to Tur­key se­ve­ral times. The coun­try was in­te­res­ted in clas­si­cal Cen­tral Eu­ro­pean mu­sic, and he sup­port­ed re­forms in mu­sic edu­ca­ti­on. To­day, Tur­key does not need tu­to­ring. It pro­du­ces out­stan­ding ar­tis­tic per­so­na­li­ties. Utku Asan was born in Is­tan­bul in 1999 and be­gan play­ing the pia­no at the age of se­ven. He stu­di­ed in Is­tan­bul with Ece Dir­mici, then at the HfMDK first with Prof. Ale­xej Gor­latch and curr­ent­ly with Dmit­ry Ablogin.

Re­cor­de: May 2021 in the Gre­at Hall of the HfMDK
Sound en­gi­neers: Win­fried Hy­ro­ni­mus, Jens Mei­er, Chris­toph Schul­te