Elias

As with the spectacular performance of « Parsifal », with which Hengelbrock blew the dust off the reception history of Wagner’s score in 2013, this time too the claim is for a performance entirely in the spirit of the composer. Although it will hardly be possible to assemble 396 performers (271 of them singers) on the Konzerthaus stage as at the premiere in Birmingham in 1846, and there will be no special train for the musicians involved, the chorus and orchestra are nevertheless opulently cast.

However, the dramatic character of the work, which Mendelssohn designed entirely in the spirit of Romanticism, lives not only from the « rather thick, heavy and full choruses » and the large orchestral cast, but also from the voices of the soloists who embody the prophets Elijah and Obadiah, the widow or the queen. Singers like Michael Nagy, Lothar Odinius and Genia Kühmeier are not only proven musical partners of Thomas Hengelbrock, but also like-minded people when it comes to the musical interpretation of a work from the gesture of language. So the signs are good for a historically authentic reception by the audience: a repeat of the sensational premiere success.