衛武營國家藝術文化中心 National Kaohsiung Center for the Arts (Weiwuying)

"Andris NELSONS conducted with concise focus and vigor and elicited the orchestra both tonal beauty and technical precision and visible enthusiasm." ——The Boston Globe

"[Mao] FUJITA is a musician of tremendous versatility and taste, with a poetic sense of pulse and eloquent, insightful, fearless articulation."——The Times

The Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, named after the building that housed it and the concert hall, is renowned for its unique history. Under the leadership of MENDELSSOHN, the orchestra adhered to strict standards to produce perfect sound, while also showcasing a high level of musical taste by premiering such timeless classics as SCHUBERT's The Great, SCHUMANN's Spring and BRUCKNER’s Symphony No. 7. In 2023, the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig will once again visit Taiwan. Andris NELSONS, the Gewandhauskapellmeister (Music Director and Principal Conductor), infuses the orchestra's acclaimed rich sound with his signature explosiveness, revitalizing familiar repertoire and creating amazement time and time again. The program will guide the audience through the orchestra's visionary history via three works. MENDELSSOHN's concert overture, The Fair Melusine, is based on German water-nymph literature. At the beginning of the piece, the flowing sound of the woodwind seems to foreshadow WAGNER's legendary Rhine. SCHUMANN's Piano Concerto, completed in 1854, whose first movement premiered at Gewandhaus Leipzig in 1841. Combining power and tenderness, the piano and the orchestra are closely interwoven, redefining the concerto. In the second half, MENDELSSOHN's Symphony No. 3, Scottish, seems to focus on the cultural landscape of the northern country but is full of historical reflections. The opening theme runs throughout the piece, setting the standard for symphonic composition in the late 19th century. As the orchestra's motto states, Res severa est verum gaudium–true joy is a serious matter, and serious matters are true joy! In November 2023, experience Leipzig's musical wisdom and feel the city's glory.

  Pre-talk  

2023/11/9(Thu)19:00 Concert Hall

  Program  

F. MENDELSSOHN: The Fair Melusine Overture 

R. SCHUMANN: Piano Concerto in a minor, Op. 54 

F. MENDELSSOHN: Symphony No. 3 in a minor, Op. 56 Scottish

Encore Pieces:

F. POULENC: Improvisation No.12 in E-flat Major "Hommage à SCHUBERT"

  Creative and Production Team  

Conductor｜Andris NELSONS

Piano｜Mao FUJITA

Gewandhausorchester Leipzig

  Artists Introduction  

Conductor｜Andris NELSONS

©Marco Borggreve, 2018

Andris NELSONS is Music Director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Gewandhauskapellmeister of the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig. These two positions, in addition to his leadership of a pioneering alliance between both institutions, have firmly established Grammy Award-winning NELSONS as one of the most renowned and innovative conductors on the international scene today.
NELSONS' positions in Boston and Leipzig commenced in the 2014/15 season and in February 2018, respectively. Autumn 2019 marked a ground-breaking highlight for NELSONS, the Boston Symphony Orchestra and the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig: three performances featuring musicians from both institutions within one joint orchestra were given at Boston's Symphony Hall as part of the alliance between the two orchestras. Earlier this year, this unique partnership between both orchestras culminated in another highlight, a joint release of the major symphonic works by Richard STRAUSS for Deutsche Grammophon, including STRAUSS' Festliches Präludium jointly performed by musicians from both orchestras. To mark the release, NELSONS and the Gewandhausorchester embarked on a major residency tour to London, Hamburg, Vienna and Paris to perform two all-STRAUSS programs.
This season, NELSONS and the Boston Symphony Orchestra embark on a major tour to Japan, including three prestigious concert dates at Tokyo's Suntory Hall. Furthermore, the BSO and NELSONS will continue their guest appearances at Carnegie Hall in April 2023 together with Anne-Sophie MUTTER and Gautier CAPUÇON. Following their season opening tour together in September, a major highlight for NELSONS and the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig include their residency at the Salzburg Easter Festival in April 2023, where three symphonic programs will be presented in addition to performances of WAGNER's Tannhäuser featuring Jonas KAUFMANN in the title role. In May 2023, the Gewandhaus zu Leipzig present the MAHLER Festival in Leipzig where NELSONS will conduct Symphonies No. 2 and 8. Elsewhere, NELSONS will continue collaborating with the Berliner Philharmoniker and Mitsuko UCHIDA this season, before returning to work with the Wiener Philharmoniker – with whom he conducted the prestigious New Year's Day concert in 2020, broadcast to millions across the world – and will also embark on a European tour featuring LANG Lang and the Mahler Chamber Orchestra.
Andris NELSONS has an exclusive recording relationship with Deutsche Grammophon, which has paved the way for three landmark projects with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig and the Wiener Philharmoniker. NELSONS and the Boston Symphony Orchestra partner on recordings of the complete SHOSTAKOVICH symphonies and the opera Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District – this cycle is already the recipient of four Grammy awards in the categories Best Orchestral Performance and Best Engineered Album. Furthermore, NELSONS and the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig continue their critically acclaimed Bruckner symphonic cycle. Both cycles released their fifth instalments in 2021. NELSONS' recordings of BEETHOVEN's complete symphonies with the Wiener Philharmoniker, in celebration of the composer's 250th birthday, were released in October 2019.
Born in Riga in 1978 into a family of musicians, Andris NELSONS began his career as a trumpeter in the Latvian National Opera Orchestra whilst studying conducting. He was Music Director of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra from 2008-2015, Principal Conductor of the Nordwestdeutsche Philharmonie in Herford, Germany 2006-2009 and Music Director of the Latvian National Opera 2003-2007.

Piano｜Mao FUJITA

©Mao Fujita_Foto_Dovile Sermokas

With an innate musical sensitivity and naturalness to his artistry, 24-year old pianist Mao FUJITA has already impressed many leading musicians as one of those special talents which come along only rarely, equally at home in MOZART as the major romantic repertoire.

Born in Tokyo, FUJITA was still studying at the Tokyo College of Music in 2017 when he took First Prize at the prestigious Concours International de Piano Clara Haskil in Switzerland, along with the Audience Award, Prix Modern Times, and the Prix Coup de Coeur, which first brought him to the attention of the international music community. He was also the Silver Medalist at the 2019 Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow, where his special musical qualities received exceptional attention from a jury of leading musicians.

FUJITA has been invited to appear in recital at major international festivals including the Klavier-Festival Ruhr, Tsinandali and Riga-Jurmala festivals, among others, and he makes his highly-anticipated US recital debut at Carnegie Hall in January 2023. Recent and upcoming orchestral highlights include performances with the Gewandhausorchester, Munich Philharmonic, Royal Philharmonic, Royal Concertgebouw, Philharmonique de Radio France, Konzerthaus Berlin, Yomiuri Nippon Symphony, Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony, Israel Philharmonic, RAI, Filarmonica della Scala, and Lucerne Festival orchestras, while his many conductor relationships include Vasily PETRENKO, Christoph ESCHENBACH, Riccardo CHAILLY, and Andris NELSONS.
In November 2021, FUJITA signed an exclusive multi-album deal with Sony Classical International. The new partnership sees him explore many facets of repertoire across several releases, starting with an eagerly-anticipated studio recording of MOZART's complete piano sonatas, which is due for release in October 2022, following an acclaimed series of performances of the complete sonatas at the Verbier Festival in 2021. FUJITA has been invited to perform the same set of works, interspersed with sets of Variations, over five concerts for his debut at London's Wigmore Hall at the end of the 22/23 season.
Starting piano lessons at the age of three, FUJITA won his first international prize in 2010 at the World Classic in Taiwan, and became a laureate of numerous national and international competitions such as the Rosario Marciano International Piano Competition in Vienna (2013), Zhuhai International Mozart Competition for Young Musicians (2015), and the Gina Bachauer International Young Artists Piano Competition (2016).

Mao FUJITA is moving to Berlin for further studies with Kirill GERSTEIN.

Gewandhausorchester Leipzig

©Gert Mothes

The Gewandhausorchester is the oldest civic symphony orchestra in the world. The enterprise was founded in 1743 by a group of 16 musical philanthropists – representatives of the nobility as well as regular citizens - forming a concert society by the name of Das Große Concert. On taking residence in the trading house of the city's textile merchants (the “Gewandhaus”) in 1781, the ensemble assumed the name Gewandhausorchester. Many celebrated musicians have been appointed to the office of Gewandhauskapellmeister (Music Director and Principal Conductor), including J.A. HILLER, F. MENDELSSOHN, Nikisch ARTÚR and Kurt MASUR. After his inauguration in 2005, Riccardo CHAILLY's phenomenally successful tenure as Gewandhauskapellmeister came to an end in 2016. Andris NELSONS assumed the position of Gewandhauskapellmeister in the 2017/18 season.
The Gewandhausorchester's unique contribution to Europe's historical and current musical wealth has been recognized with the award of the European Cultural Heritage Label.
Music lovers worldwide revere the highly individual sound palette that distinguishes the Gewandhausorchester from all other symphony orchestras. This unique sound identity, along with the extraordinarily rich diversity of the repertoire which the Gewandhausorchester performs, is cultivated in over 200 performances each year in the Orchestra's three “homes”: as concert orchestra in the Gewandhaus, orchestra of the Leipzig Opera and orchestra for the weekly performances of the cantatas of J.S. BACH with the Thomanerchor in St. Thomas's Church. No other elite symphony orchestra dedicates itself so intensively to the performance of the music of J.S. Bach.
 
The Gewandhausorchester has toured the globe on a regular basis since 1916 and enjoys almost unparalleled presence in the media of radio, television, CD and DVD.
 
Few other ensembles have exerted such significant and enduring influence on the development of the symphonic music tradition as the Gewandhausorchester. Throughout its history, the Orchestra has consistently attracted the collaborative energies of the world's most eminent composers, conductors and soloists. The Gewandhausorchester performed a complete cycle of the symphonies of BEETHOVEN during his lifetime (1825/26), as well as the first ever cycle of BRUCKNER's symphonies to be mounted (1919/20). WAGNER's Prelude to Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, BEETHOVEN's 5th Piano Concerto Emperor, Brahms' Violin Concerto and Deutsches Requiem and Bruckner's 7th Symphony are just a fraction of the wealth of the core symphonic repertoire to be given its first performance by the Gewandhausorchester. The Orchestra commissions and premieres new works each season to this day. 

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