Vienna Philharmonic 1

“It was love at first sight with the Vienna Philharmonic,” says Christian Thielemann, who debuted at the Vienna Staatsoper in 1987 and has been associated with the orchestra from the city on the Danube for almost a quarter of a century. His first appearance with the Vienna Philharmonic was in 2000 - with Richard Strauss. No wonder, as Thielemann is completely in his element with this composer. He knows how to tame his flooding waves of sound, never making Strauss sound uncouth or noisy but allowing the music to flow freely, without sacrificing the precision necessary. To be sure, he has a fine feel for coloristic sound effects and subtle irony. Thielemann therefore does not interpret Strauss’s Ein Heldenleben as a self-indulgent ego trip by a self-absorbed artist who elevates himself to the status of hero, but rather as unpretentious and multi-faceted. Viewed from this approach, the path to Felix Mendelssohn and his Scottish Symphony is perhaps not so distant! For this work, which was based on a trip the 20-year-old composer made to Scotland, is similarly about sonic images, containing whipping storms and surging waves. Even Richard Wagner, another Thielemann idol, was later inspired by Mendelssohn’s invention. The world of music is tightly interconnected.