“CURIOUS AND INSPIRED”

Following his success conducting Nielsen in London, Paavo Järvi opened his Munich Philharmonic guest conducting dates this week with the same composer’s overture to the opera “Maskarade”. Reviewing the performance the Süddeutsche Zeitung commented “Even today such an important and original composer as the Dane, Carl Nielsen, receives too little attention on the German concert scene. Some of his symphonies are played, but the comic opera “Maskarade” premiered in 1906 is never encountered here. She is something of a national opera in Denmark. Even the overture shows how much wit and surprise there is in Nielsen’s music. Paavo Järvi, not just the busy chief conductor in Bremen (Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie), Paris (Orchestre de Paris) and Tokyo (NHK Symphony Orchestra), but also a welcome guest with orchestras around the world, now offered this work with the Munich Philharmonic as a virtuoso piece for large orchestra.”

Following Nielsen, Paavo’s programme took us to the heart of Russia with Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto, Stravinsky’s “Scherzo fantastique” and Shostakovich’s Symphony no. 1 leading the Süddeutsche Zeitung to to pay tribute to an “inventive, elegant and multicolored” programme in which “Paavo Järvi is so well versed – always curious and inspired.” Performing the Tchaikovsky with soloist Joshua Bell, SZ concluded “At the end there was tremendous applause. And rightly so. Both artists were completely at the height of their art.”

Audiences in Munich can catch Paavo’s last concert tonight in Gasteig, after which he makes his way to Austria for performances with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra commencing on Sunday.