Staatskapelle Berlin

“With Strauss, I know what I’m getting: elegance and an unmistakable German brio — fast, graceful and virtuosic,” says a conductor who knows the music of Richard Strauss better than anyone. Christian Thielemann and his Staatskapelle Berlin are bringing a programme of pure Strauss to Frankfurt: three works that embody the qualities in this composer that Thielemann values so much. ‘Everything beautiful in his work is subversive, and everything subversive is beautiful.’ For the maestro, who has an enormous ability to shape sound and colour, Strauss is simply “a contemporary to this day”. He is a musician who teaches us to look behind the scenes and read between the lines, and he has a lot to say to us precisely because he is so much a part of this world.”

Camilla Nylund also has a special feel for the subversive beauty and beautiful subversiveness in Richard Strauss's music. She has recently shone at the Berlin State Opera Unter den Linden as the Field Marshal in Der Rosenkavalier and as the Empress in Die Frau ohne Schatten, and in Vienna in Arabella in the title role, all under the baton of Christian Thielemann. ‘Strauss was an incredible musical dramatist,’ says the Finnish soprano. ‘His soprano parts are a treat for the voice; they just sit very well in the throat. It's also absolutely fascinating how he uses the voice together with the language.”