September 2018
Musicians of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra are very happy to join in
focusing the spotlight once again on outstanding composer and MCO friend
George Benjamin. This concert is part of a Berliner Philharmoniker
focus on the composer in the 2018/19 season. The programme begins with
Arnold Schönberg’s Verklärte Nacht for string sextet op. 4, and concludes with the minimalist chamber opera of George Benjamin, Into the Little Hill (libretto by Martin Crimp). Former MCO Artistic Partner Isabelle Faust leads Verklärte Nacht,
which also features violinist Anne Katharina Schreiber, violists
Antoine Tamestit and Danuscha Waskiewicz, and cellists Jean-Guihen
Queyras and Christian Poltéra. Sir George Benjamin himself conducts his
opera, Into the Little Hill.
George Benjamin chose the Mahler Chamber Orchestra to play the world premiere of his highly acclaimed opera, Written on Skin,
after having conducted the MCO in a concert at the Lucerne Festival in
2009: “I was physically struck by the sound the orchestra makes; it has a
sort of golden colour. It was one of the most important, meaningful
musical collaborations I can remember in all my life.” The MCO will
perform Written on Skin in Berlin and Hamburg in November 2018.
This performance has been generously sponsored by the Aventis Foundation.