Göteborgs Konserthus Sunday with Hannigan

Arnold Schönberg (1874-1951) Chamber Symphony No 1 (arr Webern) Arnold Schönberg saw the opportunity to say goodbye to the orchestra's monumental sound. Chamber music passages in Mahler's symphonies and Brahms' orchestral movements showed the way. He realized his idea of a symphony bordering on chamber music in 1906 with the composition of Chamber Symphony No. 1, whose complex interplay of 15 solo instruments he called "great polyphony". During performances he made a painstaking effort to "make the gentlemen aware that this was chamber music." As late as 1947 he said of the 1st Chamber Symphony: “The understanding of my music still suffers from the fact that the musicians do not see me as a normal, ordinary composer, ... but as a modern, dissonant twelve-tone experimenter... But I want nothing more (if at all) than for people to think of me as a better kind of Tchaikovsky – for God's sake: a little better, but that's all.” In practice, it was primarily the extremely difficult interplay that prevented the chamber symphony from breaking through. Schönberg had his student Anton Webern adapt the work into a quintet. The chamber symphony thus became chamber music – the work was traced back to its aesthetic roots. Webern worked out his version in late 1922, with the instrumentation for violin and flute (or 2nd violin), cello and clarinet (or viola), and piano. In January 1923 he revised this arrangement thoroughly to suit his teacher's highly detailed ideas. How deeply rooted in romanticism the expressive content of the chamber symphony was for Schönberg in both versions is clear from his admonitions to the performers: "The B-flat major part of the Adagio... it begins calmly, contemplatively, and its climax need not be passionate at all, but rather increased intimacy . It's strange: passion, anyone can do it! But intimacy, the chaste, higher form of emotion, seems to be denied to most people.”

Alban Berg (1885-1935) Seven Early Songs Night Song amid the reeds The Nightingale Crowned with trauma Indoors Ode to love Summer days Of Alban Berg's total of 88 lieder, most were composed between the ages of sixteen and twenty-four. 70 constituted composition studies during his apprenticeship with Arnold Schönberg. In October 1904, Berg began to practice in a civil service making statistics on the need for macadam and on animal imports to cover the need for horsehair (!). On the side, he studied economics at the University of Vienna. His sister Smaragda and brother Charly saw Schönberg's and Alexander Zemlinsky's advertisement for teaching music theory and secretly went there to showcase some of Alban's songs. Schönberg offered to accept the 19-year-old student without any claim to fees. When Berg's wealthy aunt died in November 1905 (she left, among other things, eight tenements in Vienna and a large estate), he was given the opportunity to devote himself to music full-time. In the same winter, he made his debut as a composer by accompanying his sister in the song Die Nachtigall at the opening of a widow's and children's home. As the real debut, however, counts a concert on 7 November 1907 with works also by other Schönberg students. Then a fugue for string quintet and piano was performed, as well as Liebesode, Die Nachtigall and Traumgekrönt. The fugue was applauded but the songs received a very lukewarm reception.

Gabriel Fauré (1845-1924) String quartet e minor Op 121 Allegro moderato Andante Allegro This is Fauré's last completed work. But it is the first piece of chamber music he wrote without a piano. Fauré, who throughout his life regarded Beethoven's late quartets as unsurpassed, had for the longest time refused to deal with the genre. This attitude towards works that are considered unattainable is not new. Perhaps best known is Brahms's many years of hesitation before writing symphonies. Even Fauré's teacher Saint-Saëns hesitated long, but he never won the same success with his two string quartets as he had in other genres. However, we must be happy that Fauré relented at the last moment. His work forms an important part of the quartet of Quatuors a cordes which is France's contribution to the great string quartets, along with the quartets of César Franck, Claude Debussy and Maurice Ravel. Fauré's quartet, unlike his three colleagues, is 3-movement. It is as if he wanted to show that one could not only increase the number of movements as the admired Beethoven had done in his late quartets, but also decrease it. In a letter to his wife after the piece's completion, he certainly toyed with the idea of inserting an additional sentence between No. 1 and 2, but believes that it is not really necessary. Incidentally, three movements were typical of Fauré's late chamber music works. Only the second piano quintet is an exception. The first movement has three dominant tonal thoughts, taken from the composer's unfinished violin concerto op. 14. The first two are expressed in the opening main theme, where the first idea is presented in the viola and the second in the first violin. The third is the side theme in G major. The more light-hearted finale, Allegro, opens with the main theme in cello (Fauré really distributes the graces) to pizzicato accompaniment.

Ernest Chausson (1855-1899) Chanson Perpétuelle It is said that if Marcel Proust had written music, it might have sounded something like Ernest Chausson's: intensely passionate, but rarely grand gestures. Chausson's fiery, even erotic, musical language derives largely from his teacher, César Franck. Chausson does not have a rich output, but has written a number of finely tuned songs. Chanson Perpétuelle (1898) is a declaration of love to an absent lover and is taken from Charles Cro's poem of the same name ('The Eternal Song'). Chausson is remembered as one of the most prominent and influential members of the Franck circle, and having purged himself of his early musical influences, he and other friends sought to renew interest in pure forms of classicism. Chanson Perpétuelle is free from the heavy Wagnerian language and exaggerated drills and arpeggios found in Chausson's early works. Barbara Hannigan recorded the piece on her record Infinite Voyage in 2023 with the Emerson Quartet. Jenny Svensson

Soprano and conductor Barbara Hannigan is Principal Guest Conductor of the Gothenburg Symphony since 2019. Embodying music with an unparalleled dramatic sensibility, Barbara Hannigan is an artist at the forefront of creation. Her artistic colleagues include John Zorn, Krszysztof Warlikowski, Simon Rattle, Sasha Waltz, Kent Nagano, Vladimir Jurowski, Andreas Kriegenburg, Andris Nelsons, Esa Pekka Salonen, Christoph Marthaler, Antonio Pappano, Katie Mitchell, and Kirill Petrenko. The late conductor and pianist Reinbert de Leeuw has been an extraordinary influence and inspiration on her development as a musician. The Grammy Award winning Canadian musician has shown a profound commitment to the music of our time and has given the world première performances of nearly 100 new creations. Hannigan has collaborated extensively with composers including Boulez, Zorn, Dutilleux, Ligeti, di Castri, Stockhausen, Khayam, Sciarrino, Barry, Dusapin, Dean, Benjamin and Abrahamsen. A passionate musician of unique and courageous choices, Hannigan is renowned for creating innovative orchestral programs, combining new and older repertoire. In recent years she has been conducting world class orchestras including the Concertgebouw and Cleveland Orchestras, Montreal Symphony, Rome's Accademmia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, has ongoing relationships with festivals including Aix en Provence and Spoleto, and has had starring soprano roles on opera stages including London's Covent Garden, Teatro San Carlo in Naples, Paris Opera's Palais Garnier, New York's Lincoln Center, and the opera houses of Berlin, Hamburg and Munich. The past few seasons have brought a new presentation of Poulenc's opera La Voix Humaine, and recent world premieres include Golfam Khayam's I am not a tale to be told with Iceland Symphony Orchestra, John Zorn's Split the Lark and Star Catcher, Zosha di Castri's In the Half Light with the Toronto and Montreal Symphony Orchestras, new works by Sandström and Sciarrino, and a project with pianists Katia and Marielle Labeque inspired by the life and music of Hildegard von Bingen with new music from David Chalmin and Bryce Dessner. The 2024-2025 season brings return conducting engagements to Gothenburg Symphony, London Symphony, Munich Philharmonic, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Danish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Iceland Symphony, l'Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne and Kollegium Musicum WInterthur. She holds several principal guest and associate artist positions, and in 2026 will take the helm of Iceland Symphony Orchestra as their chief conductor and artistic director. Barbara’s commitment to the younger generation of musicians led her to create the mentoring initiatives Equilibrium Young Artists (2017), and Momentum: our Future Now (2020), both initiatives offering both guidance and performing opportunities to young professional artists. She was recently named the Reinbert de Leeuw Professor of Music at London's Royal Academy of Music and has been visiting professor at the Juilliard School in New York. On record, Barbara Hannigan’s fruitful relationship with Alpha Classics began in 2017 with the release of Crazy Girl Crazy, winning a Grammy and a Juno. More critically-acclaimed recordings followed, including Vienna: fin de siècle with pianist Reinbert de Leeuw, La Passione featuring works by Nono, Haydn and Grisey and Infinite Voyage, joining her colleagues of the Emerson String Quartet. In 2024 she released the ecstatic vocal works of Messiaen with pianist Bertrand Chamayou and a live recording of John Zorn’s compositions with pianist Stephen Gosling. Barbara Hannigan resides in Finistère, on the northwest coast of France.

Norwegian Terje Skomedal is principal for violin 2 in the Gothenburg Symphony. He studied at the Barratt-Due Music Institute in Oslo and with Giuliano Carmignola in Lucerne where he took a soloist diploma. Terje Skomedal has worked as concertmaster in the Norrandsoperan orchestra in Umeå and in several Norwegian orchestras. He has extensive experience as a chamber musician and has toured internationally with the chamber orchestras Oslo Camerata and Spira Mirabilis as well as appeared as a soloist with several Norwegian and foreign orchestras.

Cellist Claes Gunnarsson has toured all over the world as a soloist, chamber musician, orchestral musician and teacher. He debuted at a young age as a soloist in Dvorak's Cello Concerto together with the Gothenburg Symphony and was subsequently invited as a solo cellist. A position he has held since 1998. As an active chamber musician, Claes Gunnarsson has collaborated with the violinists Leonidas Kavakos and Nikolaj Znaider, the pianists Christian Zacharias, Peter Jablonski and Hélèn Grimaud, but above all has given concerts for 20 years together with his colleagues Sara Trobäck and Per Lundberg in the piano trio Trio Poseidon. Claes Gunnarsson is also a teacher at the College of Stage and Music at the University of Gothenburg. He plays a cello built in 1707 by David Tecchler, a generous loan from the Järnåker Foundation.

Since 2022, Markus Lang has held the position of principal double bass at the Gothenburg Symphony. He has also appeared as principal double bassist with orchestras such as the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in Stockholm and the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra and played with the Philadelphia Orchestra. Markus Lang is a graduate of the Juilliard School and the Curtis Institute of Music, where he studied with Hal Robinson, Joseph Conyers, Edgar Meyer and Albert Laszlo. During his time at Juilliard, he was very active in historical performance practice and toured Scandinavia and New Zealand with the school's early music ensemble, Juilliard 415. His versatility and interests extend to contemporary music, where he explores compositions that showcase the double bass's diversity of colors and capabilities. For GSOplay, Markus Lang has recorded Kaija Saariaho's work Folia for double bass and electronics. Markus Lang was born into a musical family and traveled as a child between New Jersey and the family's summer home in Viitasaari, Finland. He has spent several summers at prestigious festivals, including the Verbier Festival, the Music Academy of the West and the Lucerne Festival Academy. Markus Lang has the privilege of playing on a rare English double bass by George Panormo, generously lent by the Gothenburg Symphony.

Juan Zurutuza is a pianist trained in Mexico and the Netherlands. He studied with Rian de Waal at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague from 2001-2008. He has played solo and chamber music concerts with members of the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra and the Concertgebouw Orchestra in Scandinavia, Europe and North America. Since 2022, Juan Zurutuza is pianist in the Gothenburg Symphony. He is currently studying with pianist Robert Durso, thanks to several scholarships received from GS Vänner, the Marianne & Ary Paley Scholarship Fund, the Eduard Magnus Music Fund and the Mary von Sydows Donation Fund.

From 1995, Erik Risberg was employed as pianist in the Gothenburg Symphony with performances also on the organ, harpsichord and other piano instruments. He was pianist at rehearsals with the Gothenburg Symphony Choir and performed regularly as a chamber musician, including in a piano duo with Bengt Forsberg. In 2016, they performed in Gothenburg's Konserthus with Busoni's large Fantasia contrapunttistica as well as pieces by Chaminade and Chabrier. In 2012, Erik Risberg was a soloist with the Gothenburg Symphony in Gerald Finzi's Eclogue for piano and orchestra. Erik Risberg has also for many years been a valued teacher of musical design at the University of Stage and Music in Gothenburg and also gives introductions at the Symphony Orchestra's concerts.

During the past season, American conductor Levi Hammer has appeared with a number of orchestras in Europe and the USA. He was assistant conductor for the Rhine Gold at the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and for Die Walküre and Götterdämerung at the Deutsche Oper Berlin, as well as for Wozzeck at the Aix-en-Provence Festival. Hammer has worked at the Komische Oper Berlin and at the Hessisches Staatstheater Wiesbaden. He has been part of Barbara Hannigan's program Equilibrium Artists and worked together with Hannigan in Munich, Stockholm and Paris. As assistant conductor at Central City Opera in Colorado, he led performances such as Ned Rorem's Our Town, a work he studied with the composer. For four seasons he was also part of the management of the Cincinnati Opera. As a recipient of the Ansbacher Conducting Fellowship, he spent a summer with the Vienna Philharmonic at the Salzburg Festival, performing with concertmaster Rainer Honeck. Hammer has acted as assistant conductor to some of the most esteemed conductors of our time, including Sir Simon Rattle, Gustavo Dudamel, Robert Spano, Donald Runnicles, Lorin Maazel, Matthias Pintscher, Oliver Knussen and Barbara Hannigan. In addition to the standard repertoire, he has a particular interest in expressionism and the Second Viennese School.