MARCUS
MERKEL

Anna Clyne: "This Moment" (2022)
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Concerto for Clarinet and Orchestra in A major, K. 622
Johannes Brahms: Symphony No. 1 in C minor, Op. 68

Sebastian Manz – clarinet
Marcus Merkel – conductor
Norddeutsche Philharmonie Rostock

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto is probably one of the top ten most popular classical concertos.Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto is probably one of the top ten most popular classical concertos. And with Sebastian Manz – who already captivated audiences in Rostock last year with his warm clarinet tone – performing the solo part, this evening is a ‘must’ for all classical music fans. The short orchestral piece ‘This Moment’, penned by Anna Clyne, also revolves around Mozart. In it, the British composer incorporates motifs from the Viennese classic’s Requiem.

Under the baton of Marcus Merkel, principal conductor at the Koblenz Theatre, Johannes Brahms’s first symphony will be performed after the interval. “I will never compose a symphony,” the composer feared as recently as the early 1870s. In the shadow of Ludwig van Beethoven’s towering example, many had ceased to venture into this form. For Brahms, too, working on his First Symphony proved to be an inner ordeal. After decades of struggle, he finally returned to an old draft during a summer holiday in Sassnitz on Rügen. “A beautiful symphony has become lodged in the Wissow cliffs,” he announced in 1874. Two years later, he completed the work in Lichtental near Baden-Baden – and the 43-year-old had indeed succeeded in renewing the genre.