Raff Symphony No. 3 Im Walde: Neue Philharmonie Hamburg/Kannenberg

[Mark Thomas]

Raff's Symphony No.3 Im Walde will be played at Hamburg's prestigeous new Elbphilarmonie on 13 November this year to celebrate the composer's bicentenary. Simon Kannenburg (author of the award-winning two volume complete Raff/von Bülow letters) will conduct the Neue Philharmonie Hamburg in Weber's Der Freischütz Overture and Strauss' Horn Concerto No.1 as well as the Raff. Full details here.

[Justin]

Will you be in attendance Mark?

[Alan Howe]

Wow! At last a Raff symphony, possibly his greatest, given by a major orchestra.

As Mark says, the conductor, Simon Kannenberg, was awarded his doctorate for his dissertation on the correspondence between Raff and Hans von Bülow.

[Mark Thomas]

Will you be in attendance Mark?

Sadly not, I will be in the US then.

[tpaloj]

It's great news, but also a missed opportunity to include one of Raff's fine overtures instead of the overplayed Weber. One of his Shakespeare overtures should have fit the bill just fine I'm sure. Personally, I'm still waiting to hear any of Raff's music in Finland...

[ewk]

Great news.
Only – I don't want to dampen the joy – the Neue Philharmonie Hamburg is essentially a freelance orchestra. That does not need to be of any significance for the quality, but it is probably not a major orchestra. Let's hope some of those responsible for the major orchestras take notice of this concert and think about programming Raff, too.

That being said, they have some videos on youtube which sound rather promising (at least the first couple of minutes). E.g. Beethoven 8

[Alan Howe]

but it is probably not a major orchestra

Thanks for that correction.

[Ilja]

It is a major venue, though; so let's not downplay the occasion too much. And seeing as it's relatively easy to get there from my neck of the woods, I'll certainly be there.

[ewk]

It is a major venue, though

Very much so, I agree! Currently listening to Im Walde, once again charmed by this symphony.

[ilbravo]

Hallo from Hamburg to everyone in the Forum.

Just to prevent disappointments: the concert will not be held in the "Elbphilharmonie", but in Hamburg's former existing historic concert hall called "Laeiszhalle". If you go to the link in the post of Mark Thomas and scroll down, you will get an impression of it. It is a very charming venue with excellent acoustics and very suitable for romantic symphonic music.
Look also here: https://www.elbphilharmonie.de/en/laeiszhalle

[Mark Thomas]

Thanks for the correction, ilbravo.

[FBerwald]

Just stumbled across this [imho] superb performance of Im Walde by Neue Philharmonie Hamburg conducted by Simon Kannenberg, I believe as part of the Raff Jubilee on 13.11.2022. I'm only including the link to the 1st movement. Movements 3 & 4 are available on the channel. I expect they might upload movement 2 eventually.

[Mark Thomas]

It's an excellent performance, I do agree. The links to all four movements are:

1. https://youtu.be/XIKc0LnxU1w
2. https://youtu.be/8cg4HHtnB_g
3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Esh0juU9j2I
4. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJFdNcH7XBY

   

[Alan Howe]

I have changed the links to movements 3 and 4 as the previous ones were defaulting for some reason to the second movement (9:24). I trust they're all now functioning well...

Thanks so much for posting about this performance. The timings for Kannenberg:
1. 13:57
2. 09:24
3. 04:37
4. 17:03

For comparison purposes...
D'Avalos:
1. 14:48
2. 09:49
3. 04:24
4. 16:00

Stadlmaier:
1. 14:18
2. 08:38
3. 04:45
4. 17:05

[Rainolf]

Nice to see this on Youtube! I had the pleasure to listen to this concert which included Weber's Freischütz-Overture and Strauss's Horn Concerto No. 1, too. Simon Kannenberg is a fine musician and musicologist. Besides of Raff, he is very active for Ferdinand Pfohl and Felix Woyrsch. Not long ago he wrote this encyclopedia article about Pfohl (in German):

https://kulturstiftung.org/biographien/pfohl-ferdinand