Three Times B

To open the concert season, the acclaimed conductor Ádám Fischer presents a programme featuring the three great Bs of classical music: Beethoven, Brahms… and naturally Bartók!

While Beethoven’s stormy Egmont Overture shook audiences in the early nineteenth century, Bartók’s The Miraculous Mandarin went even further, sparking one of the greatest theatrical scandals of the twentieth century. It’s no wonder! Bartók’s jarring dissonances depict a degenerate urban underworld, one in which three pimps force a girl into prostitution so that they can rob her clients. Among the victims is a mandarin who, despite repeated attempts on his life by the pimps, can only die when the girl embraces him. The scandal-ridden Cologne premiere, which prompted the then-mayor, Konrad Adenauer, to have the work immediately removed from the theatre’s programme, celebrates its centenary in November 2026. And Brahms’ masterful Symphony No. 1, which Hans von Bülow reverently called ‘Beethoven’s Tenth’, marks its 150th anniversary in November. If that’s not cause for celebration, what is?

Kurzeinführung 45 min vor Beginn im Beethoven-Saal