Southbank Centre Launches International Voices

On Saturday 27 September he performs with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, followed on Tuesday 30 September by a concert with the London Sinfonietta, the Ensemble’s first in its 40th season.

The latter of these concerts includes a world premiere of a Southbank Centre co-commission written by Thomas Larcher especially for Goerne. International Voices showcases the very best vocal talent in a great range of musical styles from the music of Brahms and Tchaikovsky to Jacques Brel, John Lennon, and music from both the North and South of India. Matthias Goerne’s performs Hartmann’s Gesangsszene with the London Philharmonic Orchestra on Saturday 27 September. This was Hartmann’s last work, based on the prologue to Jean Giraudoux’s drama Sodome et Gomorrhe, and remained unfinished at the time of his death in 1963.

Goerne joins the London Sinfonietta on Tuesday 30 September to give the world premiere of a new song-cycle written for him by Austrian composer Thomas Larcher. Commissioned by Southbank Centre and Casa da Musica, Porto, Die Nacht der Verlorenen sets poetry by Austrian poet Ingeborg Bachmann to music by Larcher. His music mixes Schoenbergian expressionism with a cool post-modern eclecticism. He is a major figure in the European music scene and has a strengthening profile in the UK, with a busy year in London ahead. A prolific and talented performer, as well as gifted composer, he performs in the concert as the soloist in the UK premiere of his own piano concerto Bose Zellen (Free Radicals). Larcher’s music is framed by works from the Japanese master, Toru Takemitsu.

For the last of Matthias Goerne’s concerts (Thursday 2 October), he presents an intriguing recital programme of songs in German and Russian, including Brahms’ Four Serious Songs, which were the last songs he composed, then 63 years old. He died less than a year later. This song-cycle, which uses texts from the Old Testament, and the famous words of St. Paul to the Corinthians, "Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels and have not charity [love, agape], I am become as a sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal," culminating in the exclamation, "But now abide faith, hope, and charity, these three, but the greatest of these is charity," has the character of a musical last will and testament by Brahms. Set alongside this cycle are Wolf and Shostakovich settings of poems by Michelangelo. Goerne is joined by pianist Alexander Schmalcz.

During the rest of the International Voices season there is the opportunity to hear recitals by two of the finest counter-tenors in the world, David Daniels (Wednesday 15 October) and Philippe Jaroussky (Monday 23 March), a joint concert by superstars Anna Netrebko and Dmitri Hvorostovsky (Tuesday 19 May), and a staged version of Schubert’s Winterreise with tenor Mark Padmore and director Katie Mitchell (Wednesday 3 June). In contrast Barb Jungr presents a selection of songs by Jacques Brel, John Lennon and Randy Newman (Monday 9 February).

For inspiration outside the Western classics, audiences can hear singers from both the North and South of India: Pandit Ulhas Kashalkar and Purnima Chaudhuri are accompanied by tabla player Pandit Suresh Talwalkar (Saturday 29 November), the great vocalist Bombay Jayashri duets with Shubha Mudgal (Sunday 7 December). Choirs also feature in the series, with performances by Southbank Centre Associate Artists The Sixteen (Tuesday 17 March), and the Moscow Conservatory Chamber Choir (Sunday 26 October). -- www.southbankcentre.co.uk