The 29th Deutschlandsberg Piano Spring, which has the difficult task of accompanying us musically into what is now the fourth year of the global state of emergency. year of the global state of emergency, at the beginning of which the the beginning of a murderous fratricidal war in the heart of the beginning of a murderous fratricidal war in the heart of follows - how could it be otherwise - an unusual and remarkable concept. The otherwise in in this series of events plays such an important role, is this time Russian music, which usually plays such an important role in this series of events, is this time limited to only two works (Rachmaninov's Trio op. 9, dedicated to the memory of Tchaikovsky and and Skriabin's last "tonal" sonata op. 53) - and the Slavic brother nations come, if one looks at the in indispensable in a piano festival, the Slavic brother nations, apart from the Chopin, who is simply indispensable in a piano festival (Viktor Ullmann, who was born on the Polish-Czech border and fell victim to the brown delusion, came to Vienna at the age of 11): This makes it clear, first of all, that the music has a task that stands high above the din of war, politics and everyday worries.
A direct consequence of this programmatic decision is the bipolarity of the overall program: it is divided in two between the poles "Paris" and "German-speaking area" (in which Vienna, of course, occupies a special position) and visualizes the "rest of the world" only symbolically, albeit with two particularly striking voices: the Norwegian Grieg and the Romanian Enescu with works written in Bergen and Bucharest. The singular interrelationship of sound and word will be the focus of attention three times, at emblematic points, namely at the very beginning, in the middle and at the end of the Piano Spring: in a program dedicated to the triumvirate of the Lied Schubert/ Schumann/Brahms, an evening reviving the genre of melodrama, which has almost fallen into oblivion, and finally an "exotic" event involving nature as a third element, in which birds will also have their say. In any case, the faithful of the Deutschlandsberg Piano Spring can now count for the 29th time on the fact that each of the works included in the program is worth listening to and thinking about, and that in addition to the stars who have long since become favorites, young performers have also found their place in it: It is and remains, from A to Z, a celebration of art reliably triumphing over absurdity and aberration in an intimate setting that contributes to allowing human closeness and warmth to come into their own even in difficult times.
Saturday, February 04, 2023, 6 p.m., Music School
Anna Lucia Richter ( mezzo-soprano) & Till Fellner ( piano)
Saturday, February 25, 2023, 6 p.m., Music School
Shunta Morimoto (piano)
Saturday, March 18, 2023, 6 p.m., Music School
Elisabeth Leonskaja (piano)
Sunday, March 19, 2023, 6 p.m., Music School
Altenberg Trio Vienna
Saturday, March 25, 2023, 6 p.m., Music School
Wolfgang Holzmair (speaker) & Paul Gulda ( piano)
Sunday, May 07, 2023, 6 p.m., Music School
Altenberg Trio Vienna
Saturday, May 13, 2023, 6 p.m., Music School
Elisabeth Leonskaja (piano)
Friday, May 26, 2023, 7:30 p.m., Music School
Shani Diluka (piano) & Johnny Rasse (actor and birdcall imitator, respectively)
Friday, June 16, 2023, 7:30 p.m., School of Music
Paul Lewis (piano)