Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin, Karina Canellakis

The suffering people

Blindly from one

hour to the next,

Like water from a cliff

Thrown from cliff to cliff,

Year after year, plunging into the unknown.”

“So wrote Friedrich Hölderlin in 1798 in his ‘Song of Destiny.’” The question remains: How much of that rather ungodly fatalism also resonates in Ludwig van Beethoven’s “Fate” Symphony, often interpreted as defiant?

The two artists, who were the same age, never met—and yet their works were created close together in time: Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony was completed exactly ten years after Hölderlin’s poem. A struggle with the inevitable, with resistance and fate, connects the two.

When Hitler had Coventry destroyed in 1940, Benjamin Britten could find no other way to express his shock than to transform it into music. His Sinfonia da Requiem strikes with relentless force: pain, grief, and anger become immediately palpable. In its somber intensity, Britten’s music is reminiscent of the “hellish scherzo” from Gustav Mahler’s Ninth Symphony.

And Mozart? He, too, speaks of the deepest emotional anguish—of a despair hidden beneath the surface. One need only listen closely.

Cast:

• Karina Canellakis, conductor
• Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra

Program

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

“Idomeneo” – Overture to the opera, K. 366

Benjamin Britten

“Sinfonia da Requiem,” Op. 20

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

“Maurerische Trauermusik” K. 477

Ludwig van Beethoven

Symphony No. 5 in C minor, Op. 67

Note:

• Concert introduction: 7:10 p.m., Ludwig van Beethoven Hall, Steffen Georgi