Cast

Holly Hyun Choe

Holly Hyun Choe, in Südkorea geboren und in Los Angeles aufgewachsen, beeindruckt mit Präsenz und Strahlkraft auf dem Podium. Nach zweijähriger Tätigkeit als Assistenzdirigentin des Tonhalle-Orchesters unter der Leitung von Paavo Järvi ist sie weiterhin eine gern gesehene Gastdirigentin in den Vereinigten Staaten und Europa.

Inzwischen lebt sie in Deutschland und geht 2024/25 in ihre dritte Spielzeit als Erste Dirigentin des Kammerorchesters Ensemble Reflektor, das sich als Botschafter einer grenzenlosen Musikkultur versteht. Des Weiteren ist sie seit vergangener Saison für drei Jahre als Artiste associée mit dem Orchestre de Chambre de Genève verbunden, das sie im April 2025 sowohl im Konzert als auch mit Gerald Barrys Oper Alice's Adventures Under Ground am Grand Théâtre de Genève dirigiert.

Ein wichtiges Debüt in ihrer Heimatstadt sticht aus den Engagements der aktuellen Saison heraus: Im Mai 2025 dirigiert Holly Hyun Choe erstmals das Los Angeles Philharmonic. Im Rahmen des Dudamel Fellowships arbeitet sie dort darüber hinaus an der Seite von Gustavo Dudamel, Zubin Mehta, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Xian Zhang, Natalie Stutzmann und Philippe Jordan. Ein weiteres Debüt führt sie zum Norwegian Radio Orchestra, wo sie unter anderem Kaija Saariahos Ciel d’hiver sowie Tschaikowskis 4. Sinfonie dirigiert. Zudem kehrt sie nach erfolgreichen Sommerkonzerten mit dem Schleswig-Holstein Festivalorchester zurück zum Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich, zum Orchestre de Paris (hier steht unter anderem Schostakowitsch‘ 9. Sinfonie auf dem Programm), zum Philharmonischen Staatsorchester Hamburg und zur Kammerakademie Potsdam, mit der sie auch in München und Essen gastiert. In den vergangenen Spielzeiten dirigierte sie außerdem unter anderem das Deutsche Symphonieorchester Berlin, das Estonian National Symphony Orchestra und das Odense Symphony Orchestra.

Im Rahmen ihres Anliegens, Komponistinnen zu fördern, programmiert Holly Hyun Choe regelmäßig Werke von Ethel Smyth, Clarice Assad, Grażyna Bacewicz, Lili Boulanger, Britta Byström, Louise Farrenc, Fanny Hensel, Jennifer Higdon, Jessie Montgomery, Emilie Mayer, Caroline Shaw, Dobrinka Tabakova, Anna Thorvaldsdottir und Galina Ustvolskaya.

Holly Hyun Choe hat 2023 ihr Studium bei Prof. Johannes Schlaefli an der Zürcher Hochschule der Künste abgeschlossen. Ihre musikalische Reise begann sie autodidaktisch: Als 13-Jährige erlernte sie das Klarinettenspiel; ihren ersten Einzelunterricht auf dem Instrument erhielt sie erst im Alter von 19 Jahren. 2015 belegte sie ein Masterstudium bei Prof. Charles Peltz am New England Conservatory. Sie besuchte Meisterklassen von Bernhard Haitink, Jorma Panula, Peter Eötvös, Sylvia Caduff und Jaap van Zweden und hat Esa-Pekka Salonen (Orchestre de Paris), Fabio Luisi (Concertgebouw Orkest), Leonard Slatkin (Orchestre national de Lyon), Simone Young (Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne/Opernhaus Zürich), und Karina Canellakis (Gürzenich-Orchester Köln) assistiert.

2018 wurde sie in die Förderung Forum Dirigieren des Deutschen Musikrates aufgenommen; des Weiteren wurde sie durch einen Career Assistance Award der Solti Foundation - U.S., ein Stipendium des Taki Alsop Conducting Fellowship und im Mentoringprogramm der Peter Eötvös-Stiftung gefördert.

Performances

• Die verlorene Melodie
• 2nd Philharmonic Concert

photo: (c) Emily Turkanik

Speaker

Julian Greis

Julian Greis, born in Hattingen in 1983, studied at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Stuttgart from 2003 to 2006. During this time he already performed as a guest at the Landestheater Esslingen and Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus. For his roles in "Merlin oder Das wüste Land" he received the solo and ensemble prize of the Schauspielschultreffen in 2006. After graduating, he got a permanent engagement at the Schauspielhaus Graz with Anna Badora, where he worked with Viktor Bodó, Tom Kühnel and Christina Rast, among others. Under the directorship of Joachim Lux, he came to the Thalia Theater and worked with directors such as Antú Romero Nunes, Kornél Mundruczó, Christopher Rüping and Jette Steckel. In December 2012, he was awarded the Boy Gobert Prize for young actors by the Hamburger Bühnen and in October 2014 he was awarded the Rolf Mares Prize for "Best Actor" together with his colleagues for "Moby Dick" (directed by Antú Romero Nunes). Julian Greis has been a permanent ensemble member at the Thalia Theater since the 2009/10 season. He also works as a successful narrator for audio books and radio plays and received the German Children's Audio Book Award BEO for Best Performer in 2017 and 2018.

Performances

• Die verlorene Melodie

photo: Julia Schwendner

Musiker:innen des Philharmonischen Staatsorchesters Hamburg

The Philharmonic State Orchestra is Hamburg’s largest and oldest orchestra, looking back on many years of musical history. When the “Philharmonic Orchestra” and the “Orchestra of the Hamburg Municipal Theatre” merged in 1934, two tradition-steeped orchestras combined. Philharmonic concerts have been performed in Hamburg since 1828, artists such as Clara Schumann, Franz Liszt and Johannes Brahms being regular guests of the Philharmonic Society. The history of the opera company goes back even further: Hamburg has been home to musical theatre since 1678, even if a regular opera or theatre orchestra was only formed later. To this day, the Philharmonic State Orchestra has embodied the sound of the Hansa City, a concert and opera orchestra in one.

During its long history, the orchestra encountered great artist personalities. Apart from composers of the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries, such as Telemann, Tchaikovsky, Strauss, Mahler, Prokofiev and Stravinsky, since the 20th century chief conductors such as Karl Muck, Joseph Keilberth, Eugen Jochum, Wolfgang Sawallisch, Horst Stein, Aldo Ceccato, Christoph von Dohnányi, Gerd Albrecht, Ingo Metzmacher and Simone Young have shaped the orchestra’s sound. Renowned conductors of the pre-war era such as Otto Klemperer, Wilhelm Furtwängler, Bruno Walter, Karl Böhm and Hans Schmidt-Isserstedt gave brilliant performances, as did outstanding conductors of our times: suffice it to mention Christian Thielemann, Semyon Bychkov, Kirill Petrenko, Sir Neville Marriner, Valery Gergiev and Sir Roger Norrington.

Starting with the 2015/2016 season, Kent Nagano has taken on the position of Hamburg’s General Music Director and Chief Conductor of the Philharmonic State Orchestra and the Hamburg State Opera. In his first season Kent Nagano initiated a new project, the Philharmonic Academy, focusing on experimentation and chamber music. In 2016 Nagano and the Philharmonic undertook a successful three-week concert tour in South America, a tour of Spain followed in 2019. Since 2017 Kent Nagano and the Philharmonic State Orchestra have continued the traditional Philharmonic Concerts at the new Elbphilharmonie, for which they commissioned Jörg Widmann to compose the oratorio ARCHE, which was given its world premiere during the hall’s opening festivities. The concert recording has been released at ECM.

The Philharmonic State Orchestra offers approximately 35 concerts per season and performs more than 240 performances per year at the Hamburg State Opera and the Hamburg Ballet John Neumeier, making it Hamburg’s busiest orchestra. The stylistic bandwidth covered by the 140 musicians, ranging from historically informed performance practice to contemporary works and including concert, opera and ballet repertoire, is unique throughout Germany. Chamber Music has a long tradition at the Philharmonic State Orchestra: what began in 1929 with a concert series for chamber orchestra has been continued since 1968 by a series of chamber music only.

In 2008 Simone Young and the Philharmonic State Orchestra won the Brahms Award of the Schleswig-Holstein Brahms Society. The orchestra has recorded the complete Ring by Wagner as well as the complete symphonies of Johannes Brahms and Anton Bruckner – the latter in the rarely-performed original versions – as well as works by Mahler, Hindemith and Berg, and has released DVDs of opera and ballet productions by Hosokawa, Offenbach, Reimann, Auerbach, J.S. Bach, Puccini, Poulenc and Weber.

The members of the Philharmonic State Orchestra feel equally beholden to Hamburg’s musical tradition and responsible for the city’s artistic future. Since 1978 the musicians have been participating in education programmes in Hamburg’s schools. Today, the orchestra maintains a broad education programme, including school and kindergarten visits, patronage for music projects, introductory events for children and family concerts. The orchestra’s own academy prepares young musicians for their professional careers. The Philharmonic’s musicians thereby make an equally enjoyable and valuable contribution to tomorrow’s music education in the music metropolis of Hamburg.

Performances

• 3rd Academy Concert
• Dollhouse
• PhiSch - das Staatsorchester hautnah...
• Die Illusionen des William Mallory
• Die verlorene Melodie
• IM.PRO.LOG
• Die Gänsemagd
• 1. Blaues Konzert
• 2. Blaues Konzert
• Die Unruhenden
• Peter und der Wolf von St. Pauli

photo: Foto: Felix Broede

Mitglieder des Landesjugendorchesters Hamburg

The Hamburg Youth Orchestra (LJO), founded in 1968 as the State Youth Orchestra of the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg, is one of the oldest State Youth Orchestras in the Federal Republic.

In the 1960s there were only a few school and music school orchestras. Against this background, the Office for Youth took the initiative to create a symphony orchestra for young people interested in music, which would also represent a musical challenge for the young people. The first orchestra course took place in 1966, but failed because the literature exceeded the young people's playing skills. The conductor also had no experience with rehearsals with amateurs or aspiring professionals.

For the young people taking part, these experiences prompted them to think about how they imagined a symphonic orchestra: weekly rehearsals and the determination of the programs and the conductor by the orchestra members were the main points. The young people wanted to have the organization of the orchestra in their own hands and turned to the Youth Office with these ideas. The authority welcomed the young people's ideas to focus on the youth-care aspect of this community in the form of self-administration in addition to the artistically demanding training.

With the vision of a self-governing youth orchestra, the HJO was founded in 1968 as a state youth orchestra. The Youth Office provided the financial resources and developed the structure of the orchestra together with the young people; the first rules of procedure were adopted in 1970.

A self-managed orchestra was a novelty in the German orchestra landscape. A board elected by the orchestra should be responsible for all matters. After the initial framework conditions had been created, only continuous work showed which tasks were vital for the orchestra. According to needs, specific areas of responsibility were linked to the individual board positions.

The first conductor of the Hamburg Youth Orchestra was Herbert Bruhn, who studied at the University of Music and who founded the “Altona Chamber Orchestra” with Matthias Rieger; Together with the members of their orchestra, they were instrumental in founding the HJO.

Herbert Bruhn belonged to Professor Wilhelm Brückner-Rüggeberg's conducting class, who was recruited as a mentor for the young orchestra. In this capacity, he advised the youth orchestra on the selection of new conductors and occasionally carried the baton.

In 1983 the sponsorship changed from the Youth Office to the Cultural Authority. Over the years the number of members has increased to currently around 80 young musicians. The rehearsals were regularly supported by experienced musicians from professional orchestras. In addition to regular rehearsals and the rehearsal of three symphony programs each year, the young people organize chamber music projects and concert tours.

With the increasing level of musical training and instrumental skills of the young people, their growing musical demands, reflected in the choice and presentation of the concert programs, the Hamburg Youth Orchestra established itself in Hamburg's musical life; This was followed by joint projects with choirs and the Hamburg University of Music. The orchestra played at trade fair and congress openings, was invited to perform alongside renowned professional orchestras at the Hamburg Music Festival between 1989 and 1995 and appeared as a representative of the city at the Hamburg Days in Gdansk, Marseille and Prague.

Despite the high fluctuation that is usual for youth orchestras and the increased demands, both musically and organizationally, the democratic structure has endured to this day; only the number of positions and their profiles change in accordance with the growing tasks of the orchestra and the demands of the young people.

In 2005, the orchestra renamed itself the “Landesjugendorchester Hamburg” to emphasize the orchestra's status as the city of Hamburg's selection orchestra.

In 2007, the orchestra's sponsorship changed from the cultural authority to the Hamburg State Music Council. In the course of this change, the organizational structure was also significantly changed: from now on, the State Youth Orchestra was a project of the State Music Council. The resulting new framework conditions in particular resulted in some restrictions on the orchestra's self-administration, but self-administration was largely preserved within the framework of jointly developed rules of procedure.

In 2018, the Hamburg State Youth Orchestra celebrated its 50th anniversary.

Performances

• Die verlorene Melodie