“How can we bring the music of the present and the past into a dialogue?” That question was once asked by Pierre Boulez, the great French composer and conductor, who would have turned 100 this spring.
I am delighted that Pierre Boulez will be a focus of this year’s Musikfest Berlin and that the festival’s programme will be dedicated equally to the music of the present and the past. Pierre Boulez left his mark on the world of music not only as a composer and conductor, but also as an educator and organiser. What a wonderful occasion to invite so many orchestras and ensembles from France that we have not heard in Berlin for many years and certainly never within such a short span of time.
Beyond this focus on France, Musikfest Berlin widens its scope to encompass European and international music, presenting concerts dedicated to the Italian composer Luciano Berio, the Estonian composer Arvo Pärt and the Korean composer Younghi Pagh-Paan, for example, and culminating in the world premiere of the recently rediscovered cubist Bauhaus opera “Parabola and Circula” by the New York composer Marc Blitzstein.
Once again, Musikfest Berlin offers us a diverse and ambitious programme, ranging from Italian Renaissance and classical music to Impressionism, Modernism and contemporary works, featuring new and very recent pieces by Ondřej Adámek, Unsuk Chin, Robin de Raaff, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Rebecca Saunders, Lisa Streich and Francesca Verunelli. The concerts under the baton of the female conductors Anja Bihlmaier, Karina Canellakis, Elim Chan, Ustina Dubitsky and Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla promise to be a special musical experience.
I wish all the audiences an enriching and inspiring music festival!
Claudia Roth MdB
Member of the German Bundestag
Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media