Fabulous

Werner is head over heels in love with Margareta. And since he is The Trumpeter of Säkkingen, it makes sense to serenade his sweetheart on said instrument: The perfect trigger for Gustav Mahler to become creative and start composing. In 1884, a stage production of the novel about Werner and Margareta is put on at the Hoftheater Kassel, and Gustav Mahler writes the music for it. Out of that, Blumine is the only remaining piece. The rest was destroyed by 24-year-old Mahler who was second Kapellmeister at the time – quality control at its most radical. Since this highly romantic but isolated movement wouldn’t really fit into Mahler’s next major project either, his first symphony, seven decades went by before Blumine was rediscovered: Pure, nearly unclouded beauty by Mahler, and with a trumpet solo to melt your heart.

Des Knaben Wunderhorn (The Boy’s Magic Horn) is a collection of texts that always remained a source of inspiration for Gustav Mahler, and a point of focus in his musical thinking. The joy and suffering of love, life as a soldier, death and its gruesomeness: The Gürzenich Orchestra is once more looking forward to welcoming renowned mezzo soprano Anna Lucia Richter from Cologne who will perform songs from Des Knaben Wunderhorn.

Surely, what is nowadays referred to as Franz Schubert’s »small« C Major symphony must have felt quite »great« to the barely 21-year-old composer: The orchestra is generously staffed for the time (1818), and the wind section finds itself on the strong side of an emancipatory boost, having rarely been this prominently featured in a symphony. The young gentleman skillfully puts to use the achievements made by his Viennese role models Haydn and Beethoven – he even composes a bold scherzo which would certainly have pleased the great Ludwig. Still, Schubert tells his very own symphonic story which is far from being laden with pathos but instead defies gravity in a unique, somnambulistic way. Simply fabulous!