Around the Music Festival

The Munich Philharmoniker has announced a special concert with Tugan Sokhiev on 30 April. The concert will take place following the postponement of the performance of Tan Dun’s “Buddha Passion”, which was scheduled for 30 April and 1 May.

The performance of the cancelled “Buddha Passion”, which had its world premiere at the Dresden Festival in Germany in 2018, requires traditional Chinese instrumentalists and singers. However, China is currently experiencing a re-emergence of the new corona virus. As a result, Chinese performers and others are unable to travel to the country, which has led to the postponement of the event.

The programme for the special concert includes Khachaturian’s Flute Concerto and Brahms’ Symphony No. 4. The flute solo will be played by the orchestra’s principal flutist, Michael Martin Kofler.

Guest conductor Tugan Sokhiev resigned as music director of both the Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse and Russia’s Bolshoi Theatre after being asked by the mayor of Toulouse to issue comments clarifying his distance from the Putin regime over the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Since then, the New York Philharmonic has cancelled its guest appearances with him for the end of March and beginning of April, but the Vienna Philharmonic has not cancelled its April, the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome in May and the NHK Symphony Orchestra in January next year.

Meanwhile, in Munich, Mayor Dieter Reiter asked Valery Gergiev, who has been chief conductor of Munich Philharmonic Orchestra since 2015, to distance himself from Putin’s aggression in Ukraine and to unequivocally condemn the President’s actions. However, when Gergiev did not respond to this, he was dismissed as chief conductor.。

Photo：Münchner Philharmoniker