NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra: Thorvaldsdóttir & Abrahamsen

Lauren Snouffer / Alan Gilbert – Elbphilharmonie Visions

This concert has already taken place! 10 | 16 | 32 | 43 | 49
This concert has already taken place! 10 | 16 | 32 | 43 | 49
Alan Gilbert
Alan Gilbert © Peter Hundert
NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra
NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra © Nikolaj Lund
  • Doors open 19:00

  • Start 20:00

  • End ca. 21:00

The climate catastrophe in music

Among the composers that the exciting young music nation Iceland has brought forth, Anna Thorvaldsdóttir (n. 1977) is probably the hippest. Die Zeit once wrote that her music was »as atmospheric and surreal as the northern lights«. Chief conductor Alan Gilbert now brings one of her latest compositions to the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra, a work of urgent relevance to our times: »Catamorphosis« is a 20-minute piece highlighting what Thorvaldsdóttir calls our »fragile relationship with our planet«. First performed in Berlin in 2021, the work depicts with alternating fragile or hopeful, or brutal, even destructive sounds how drastically our world has fallen out of kilter due to the climate crisis.

Visions as a package: If you buy three or more concerts of the »Elbphilharmonie Visions« festival at the same time, you will receive a 30% discount on the ticket price. To do so, select »Visions Trio Bonus 30%« in the shopping basket.

Thorvaldsdóttir’s score garnered the utmost acclaim from the press, and from the conductor of the first performance, Kirill Petrenko, immediately after its premiere. And no less critical praise went to Hans Abrahamsen’s 2013 song cycle »Let Me Tell You«: The Guardian called this magnum opus of perhaps the most highly-regarded Scandinavian composer »the best piece of classical music written so far in the 21st century«. The Danish composer based it on the novella »Let Me Tell You« by Paul Griffith, which rearranges the 481 words of Ophelia’s monologue from Shakespeare’s »Hamlet«. The outcome was a completely new text that gives deep insights into the character of Ophelia, torn between repression, madness and liberation.

Performers

NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester

Lauren Snouffer soprano

conductor Alan Gilbert

Programme

Talk with Anna Thorvaldsdóttir and Alan Gilbert

Anna Thorvaldsdóttir
Catamorphosis

Hans Abrahamsen
Let Me Tell You für Sopran und Orchester

Festival

Elbphilharmonie Visions

Promoter: NDR / HamburgMusik

Supported by Ernst von Siemens Musikstiftung

From the Mediatheque : Videos, Podcasts, Articles

Play Video

: Concert film »Catamorphosis«

Fragile, hopeful sounds and powerful, brutal and destructive sounds: the enthralling work by Icelandic composer Anna Thorvaldsdóttir is impressively staged here.

Heard anew: Anna Thorvaldsdóttir

Questions for the composers featured in the »Elbphilharmonie Visions« New Music festival.

Heard anew: Hans Abrahamsen

5 questions for the composers featured in the »Elbphilharmonie Visions« New Music festival.

Alan Gilbert: »We really mean it seriously«

Conductor Alan Gilbert talks about the new festival »Elbphilharmonie Visions«.

Play Video

: NDR Podcast: About Music

About flying conductor's batons, rehearsals and why presenting the news is like driving a car: a podcast with conductor Alan Gilbert and newsreader Michail Paweletz (in English).

Stories with the hashtag #NewMusic

Concert streams, interviews, interesting facts: learn more about New Music.

During your visit

Elbphilharmonie Plaza

A public viewing platform on the 8th floor of the Elbphilharmonie

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Food and Drink

Before the concert and in the interval

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Coughing, clapping, chatting

Tips for your concert visit

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