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Something a little unusual this week – Music from the 2012 Bremen Music Festival – this concert featuring The Minguet Quartett and Jörg Widmann, Clarinet (as well as composer) and Harpist Xavier de Maistre with soprano Mojca Erdmann – all recorded live on September 6th and 7th 2012 by Radio Bremen and broadcast by RBB Kulturradio in Berlin.
Starting off with the 2nd String Quartet by Jorg Widmann, followed by Brahms String Quartet op. 51 – then composer Jorg Widmann joins the group as Clarinet soloist in the Four Studies by Wolfgang Rihm – this is from September 6th.
And the broadcast concludes with performances by Harpist Xavier de Maistre and Soprano Mojca Erdmann (a last minute replacement for Diana Damrau who was going into labor). Starting off this portion with Parish-Alvar’s solo fantasy “La Mandoline” and the carnivalesque opus 184 by Félix Godefroid. Erdmann then joins de Maistre in songs by Schubert and Mendelssohn and concludes with songs by Richard Strauss. The pairing of Harpist with Soprano in this setting was unusual but extremely enjoyable to listen to.
A little background on the performers: The Minguet Quartet – founded in 1988 – is today one of the most internationally sought-after string quartets and performs in all the world’s major concert halls, its interpretations, as passionate as they are intelligent, always ensuring inspiring listening experiences – “for the joy of sound and expression with which the ensemble brings the works to life enlivens even the smallest detail” (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung). The quartet is named after Pablo Minguet, a Spanish philosopher of the 18th century, who in his writings endeavored to make the fine arts accessible to the general public: The Minguet Quartet is more committed than ever to this idea.
Jörg Widmann – Jörg Widmann (born 19 June 1973) is a German composer, conductor and clarinetist. In 2023, Widmann was the third most performed living contemporary composer in the world. Formerly a clarinet and composition professor at the University of Music Freiburg, he is composition professor at the Barenboim–Said Akademie. His most important compositions are the opera Babylon, an oratorio Arche, Viola Concerto, Kantate and the concert overture Con brio. Widmann has written musical tributes to Classical and Romantic composers. He was awarded the Bavarian Maximilian Order for Science and Art in 2018 and the Bach Prize of the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg in 2023. He was Gewandhaus Composer in Leipzig and became Composer in Residence for the Berlin Philharmonic.
Mojca Erdmann received her first violin lessons at the age of six and sang in the children’s choir of the Hamburg State Opera. After graduating from high school, she studied singing with Hans Sotin at the Cologne University of Music in parallel with violin studies. In 2002, she not only won first prize at the German National Singing Competition, but also the special prize for contemporary music. In 2005 she was awarded the NDR Music Prize by the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival and the Luitpold Prize by the Kissinger Sommer.
Praised by critics and loved by audiences for her beauty of tone and impeccable artistry, soprano Mojca Erdmann is a rapidly rising star in the international music scene. Of her return to the Metropolitan Opera in 2012, the New York Timeswrote “Mojca Erdmann brought a sweet, beguiling voice and a demure sincerity to Susanna”. Known for her versatility in repertoire ranging from baroque to contemporary music, the BBC Music Magazine praised her as an “interpreter of major gifts”.
Enjoy Bremen Musikfest – a lot to chew on – some hard to digest – a lot very nourishing.
