July 4th, 2019 - Les 5 fantastiques

Renowned for its exceptionally creative programming and the homogeneity of timbre that can only come from a long history of making music together – over sixty-five years after its foundation in the aftermath of war the MKO is blazing a trail for orchestras in Germany and beyond. In the last few years the orchestra has increased its subscription ticketholders by over fifty percent, notwithstanding the ambitious content of its programmes.

Since the beginning of the 2016/17 season, Bremen-born Clemens Schuldt is the new principle conductor. He also heads the artistic planning committee, which has, besides himself, two members nominated by the orchestra and two from the management team. Under his leadership the MKO will continue to present daring, associative programmes combining works from the past and the present. With no aesthetic preconceptions and a love of experimentation Schuldt and the orchestra will continue to place their trust in the sheer impact and emotional intensity of contemporary music. Concepts such as Eastwards, Drama, Childhood, Isolation and Reformation have set the ensemble’s course in recent seasons; in 2018/19 the focus will be on the idea of ›Vorwiegend Heiter‹.

Since 1995, when Christoph Poppen took over as artistic director and established the orchestra’s unmistakable dramaturgical profile, the MKO has premiered over eighty new works by composers including Iannis Xenakis, Wolfgang Rihm, Tan Dun, Chaya Czernowin, Georg Friedrich Haas, Pascal Dusapin, Salvatore Sciarrino and Jörg Widmann. Composers such as Beat Furrer, Erkki-Sven Tüür, Thomas Larcher, Milica Djordjević, Clara Iannotta, Samir Odeh-Tamimi, Mark Andre, Peter Ruzicka, Márton Illés, Mirsolav Srenka and Tigran Mansurian have fulfilled commissions from the MKO.

In addition to the Thursday evenings at the Prinzregententheater, the orchestra’s main concert venue, the MKO has, since 2003, presented its ›Nachtmusik der Moderne‹ in the Rotunda in Munich’s Pinakothek der Moderne to packed houses of discerning listeners. Each of these concerts is devoted to the work of a single composer from the twentieth or twenty-first century. In 2015, the presentation of the MKO Songbook at the Schwere Reiter performance space in Munich established a new format, which turns the spotlight on MKO commissions and works by Munich’s own composers.

The core of the ensemble consists of twenty-eight string players, all full members of the MKO. In collaboration with a fixed pool of elite principal wind players from Europe’s leading orchestras, the MKO performs as a slender symphony orchestra that can also make its mark with major works by Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann and others. An important component in both the orchestra’s subscription series and invitation concerts elsewhere are the programmes directed by either one of the orchestra’s two concertmasters. On those evenings the unconditional commitment and shared sense of responsibility of all the musicians can come across with particular intensity.

Founded in 1950 by Christoph Stepp, four decades in the life of the MKO from 1956 onwards were shaped by Hans Stadlmair. After ten years at the helm (1995–2006), Christoph Poppen was succeeded by Alexander Liebreich as Artistic Director of the MKO. The orchestra gratefully acknowledges funding from the City of Munich, the State of Bavaria and the Region of Upper Bavaria. Since 2006/7 European Computer Telecoms AG (ECT) has, with great generosity, been the orchestra’s main sponsor. The MKO is a modern, flexible ensemble that has developed a wide range of activities in addition to its various subscription series. Each year the orchestra presents around sixty concerts in major venues across the world. Past tours have taken the orchestra to Asia, Spain, Scandinavia, South America and more. The MKO has also undertaken several tours in collaboration with the Goethe Institut, including a concert tour to Moscow and its ground-breaking workshops and concert in North Korea in autumn 2012, when the orchestra performed side by side with North Korean music students. Also the residence of the orchestra in Cartagena takes place on behalf of the Goethe Institut.

The MKO has recorded works by Karl Amadeus Hartmann, Sofia Gubaidulina, Giacinto Scelsi, Thomas Larcher, Valentin Silvestrov, Isang Yun, Joseph Haydn and Toshio Hosokawa with ECM Records. In March 2017 the long cooperation was continued with the release of Tigran Mansurian’s Requiem, a commission by MKO and RIAS Kammerchor. MKO recordings with Sony Classical include a CD with Rossini overtures and the Fauré Requiem with the Bavarian Radio Choir (ECHO Klassik winner, 2012), Mozart’s Mass in C Minor and, in May 2014, the Mozart Requiem. In 2015 Sony Classical released no less than three CDs with the MKO: flautist Magali Mosnier playing works by Mozart; oboe concertos by Hummel and Haydn played by François Leleux (ECHO Klassik winner, 2016); and an orchestral CD, conducted by Alexander Liebreich, with Mendelssohn’s incidental music for A Midsummer Night’s Dream and his Symphony no. 4. Further recordings are available amongst others also with Deutsche Grammophon, Neos, Hänssler Classic and Tudor.

Les Vents Français is one of the finest woodwind ensembles ever established, and has been performing and recording for more than a decade. Founded by six outstanding soloists, all being French or trained in the French tradition, they have all achieved distinguished international recognition both as soloists and as cham-ber musicians, as well as orchestral players or post-graduate teachers. Their aim is to use their experience and reputation, to introduce woodwind masterpieces (including those rarely performed) to a wider audi-ence, while delivering first class performances with first class musicians.

Their interpretation shows how, by honouring the French performance tradition, individual and soloistic charms can be used to blend in the performance of ensemble music, and achieve an unlimited range of col-ours, dynamics and styles. Ranging from two performers and up, the ensemble adapts according to the rep-ertoire they are performing.

Recent engagements in the last years include Asia and EU tours in prestigious concert halls in Vienna, Salz-burg, Geneva, London, Paris, Zurich, Brussels, Lucerne, Bremen, Amsterdam, Istanbul, Tokyo, Osaka, Fukuo-ka, Nagoya, Taipei, as well as a residence in the Summer Music Academy in Domaine Forget, Québec, and extensive Festival tours: Edinburgh, Bremen, Schleswig-Holstein, Rheingau, Jerusalem, Dubrovnik. They were awarded the exclusive Orlando Prize at the Dubrovnik Festival.

They continue to develop the repertoire of wind music by commissioning new pieces from a large range of living composers such as Escaich, Pécou, Connesson, Jarrell, Mochizuki, Tanada, Waxman , Rivet , Hersant, Sakai.

Their recordings include “Complete chamber music by Poulenc” released by RCA in 1999 for the centenary of Poulenc’s birth which was highly praised and awarded the 37th Record Academy Grand Prize in Japan. Now exclusively released on Warner Classics, their CD “French Connection” for Flute, Clarinet and Piano, and a double CD "Best of Quintet Music" featuring French and 20th Century Woodwind quintets (Record of the Year 2012 for Chamber Music by the Record Geijutsu Magazine, and Echo Klassik german TV Award), were followed in the autumn of 2014 by a 3 CD Box dedicated to French, Classical, and Romantic works for Woodwinds and Piano and Beethoven's Chamber Music in 2016. For their latest release, they joined forces with the Munich Chamber Orchestra for ‘Concertante!’; examples of the sinfonia concertante form by Mo-zart, Danzi, Devienne and Pleyel.