In Memoriam Lars Vogt
Composer: Johannes Brahms, Antonín Dvořák, Giovanni Battista Viotti
Performer: Christian Tetzlaff, Tanja Tetzlaff
Orchestra: Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin
Conductor: Paavo Järvi
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Ondine
Catalogue: ODE1423-2
Release: 2023
Size: 623 MB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: yes
Brahms: Double Concerto for Violin & Cello in A minor, Op. 102
01. I. Allegro
02. II. Andante
03. III. Vivace non troppo
Viotti: Violin Concerto No. 22 in A minor, G97
04. I. Moderato
05. II. Adagio
06. III. Agitato assai
07. Dvořák: Waldesruhe (Silent woods) for cello and orchestra, Op. 68 No. 5
This album by violinist Christian Tetzlaff and cellist Tanja Tetzlaff together with the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin conducted by Paavo Järvi, is dedicated in the memory of their longtime artistic partner, pianist Lars Vogt (1970–2022). At the heart of this album is Brahms, one of Lars Vogt’s favourite composers, and his late orchestral masterpiece, the Double Concerto. Brahms himself had admired one of Viotti’s violin concertos so much that he included material from the Violin Concerto no.22 into his work. With Christian Tetzlaff’s recording of the Violin Concerto, this album finally brings these two works together. Also included is Dvořák’s beautiful Silent Woods for cello and orchestra, a work by another composer that was very close to Lars Vogt’s heart.
“During the recording the feeling was that all of us were thinking of Lars all the time, the members of the orchestra too, who also valued Lars so very much. At the end there was a run-through with an audience. It was truly something like a memorial ceremony. It was the moment to say: Now we’re playing for you, Lars, and perhaps you’re listening from somewhere. We’re thinking of you, and we’re giving you this and want to preserve your memory with it. Friendship and love could really be felt in that place.” – Tanja Tetzlaff
Christian Tetzlaff is considered one of the world’s leading international violinists and maintains a most extensive performing schedule. Musical America named him ‘Instrumentalist of the Year’ in 2005. His recording of the Bartók Violin Concertos (ODE13172) received both Gramophone and ICMA Awards, and the recording was also a finalist for the BBC Music Award in 2019. His recording of the Violin Concertos by Mendelssohn and Schumann, released on Ondine in 2011 (ODE11952), and Bach Sonatas and Partitas released in 2017 (ODE12992D) received the ‘Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik’. In addition, in 2015 ICMA awarded Christian Tetzlaff as the ‘Artist of the Year’, and he also received ECHO ‘Instrumentalist of the Year’ award in 2017 for his album of Brahms Violin Sonatas (ODE12842). His recordings on Ondine with Brahms’s Trios (ODE12712D) and Violin Concertos by Dvořák and Suk (ODE12795), released in 2015 and 2016, earned Grammy nominations. In 2023, Christian Tetzlaff’s recording of Schubert’s trios together with Lars Vogt and Tanja Tetzlaff won the Opus Klassik award.
Cellist Tanja Tetzlaff performs an extensive repertoire, including the staple solo and chamber music literature, and important compositions of the 20th and 21st centuries. Tanja Tetzlaff has played with leading orchestras such as the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, Bayerischer Rundfunk, Konzerthausorchester Berlin, Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, Royal Flanders Philharmonic, Spanish National Orchestra, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Orchestre de Paris and Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, and collaborated with conductors such as Lorin Maazel, Daniel Harding, Philippe Herreweghe, Sir Roger Norrington, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Dmitri Kitajenko, Paavo Järvi, Michael Gielen and Heinz Holliger. Chamber music also plays a significant part in her career, with regular appearances alongside Leif Ove Andsnes, Alexander Lonquich, Antje Weithaas, Florian Donderer, Baiba and Lauma Skride, and her brother, Christian Tetzlaff. In 1994 Tanja founded the Tetzlaff Quartett, with Christian Tetzlaff, Elisabeth Kufferath and Hanna Weinmeister.
For more than 70 years the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin (DSO Berlin) has distinguished itself as one of Germany’s leading orchestras. Founded as the RIAS Symphony Orchestra in 1946, it was renamed the Radio Symphony Orchestra Berlin in 1956 and has borne its current name since 1993. Robin Ticciati has led the DSO as its music director since the 2017–18 season. Since its inception, the orchestra has been able to retain outstanding artist personalities, including Ferenc Fricsay, Lorin Maazel, Riccardo Chailly, Vladimir Askenazy, Kent Nagano, Ingo Metzmacher, and Tugan Sokhiev.
Estonian Grammy Award-winning conductor Paavo Järvi is widely recognised as one of today’s most eminent conductors, enjoying close partnerships with the finest orchestras around the world. He serves as Chief Conductor of the Tonhalle Orchester-Zürich, as the long-standing Artistic Director of The Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen since 2004, and as both the founder and Artistic Director of the Estonian Festival Orchestra. In addition to his permanent positions, Järvi is much in demand as a guest conductor, regularly appearing with the Berliner Philharmoniker, Concertgebouworkest, London Philharmonia Orchestra and the New York Philharmonic. He also continues to enjoy close relationships with many of the orchestras of which he was previously Music Director, including Orchestre de Paris, Frankfurt Radio Symphony and NHK Symphony Orchestra. In 2019 Paavo Järvi was named Conductor of the Year by Germany’s Opus Klassik and received the 2019 Rheingau Music Prize for his artistic achievements with The Deutsche Kammerphilharmoie Bremen in the German orchestral and cultural landscape.
All of the principals here were close associates of the late pianist Lars Vogt, and this Ondine release, which landed on classical best-seller charts in the autumn of 2023, is intended as a tribute to him. Vogt loved Brahms, and the main attraction is a performance of the Double Concerto in A minor for violin, cello, and orchestra, Op. 102, by Christian Tetzlaff, Tanja Tetzlaff, and the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin under the usually somewhat cerebral conductor Paavo Järvi, who turns in quite a passionate performance here. The Double Concerto is structured unlike anything else Brahms (or really anyone else) ever wrote, opening with quasi-improvisatory passages in the cello and then the violin that are reconciled and brought within a Classical structure as the movement proceeds. The Tetzlaffs, in an interview-format booklet, suggest that the opening represents the feuding Brahms and violinist Joseph Joachim, for whom the concerto was meant as a kind of peace offering. Whatever the actual case, the idea results in a performance of considerable tension. Also figuring into the biographical interpretation is the inclusion of Giovanni Battista Viotti’s Violin Concerto No. 22 in A minor, which at first glance may seem an odd pairing. The work was a favorite of both Brahms and Viotti, and hints of Viotti’s music seem to recur in the Brahms concerto, again as a kind of peace offering or, it has been suggested, a subconscious reference. The album ends with a warm performance by Tanja Tetzlaff of Silent Woods from Dvořák’s From the Bohemian Forest, Op. 68, not directly connected to the biographical theme but full of a spirit of calm reconciliation. It is a fine conclusion to a powerful album.