Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra

The Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks (BRSO) as a guest in the subscription

Ever since 1950, our orchestra has cooperated closely with the Bayerischer Rundfunk (Bavarian Broadcasting Company) for concert recordings, radio and CD productions. Over the course of the more than 70 years of this partnership, over 2,600 symphonic works have been recorded. This season, our partnership will take on a new dimension: as part of a season ticket exchange, we will be welcoming the BRSO conducted by Christian Thielemann to Bamberg as part of our Season Ticket A offer!

"A creative act is a sacred act." This statement was made by Sofia Gubaidulina – but it could just as easily have been said by Anton Bruckner, a man deeply rooted in his faith who was constantly asking himself about the meaning of life. Many considered the Austrian romantic composer the “church musician of the concert hall” because of his celestial and monumental works. Strongly influenced by his education in the monastery of St Florian, Bruckner prayed daily and said: “How would it look to our Lord God if I followed others and not Him?” In their guest performance, the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra will present Bruckner’s Fifth Symphony, which he worked on for several years before finally completing it in 1878. It is a composition of vast proportions, containing an abundance of moods and toweringly monumental passages – and even a catchy, folky melody that has now become a popular hit in football stadiums! Because of the solemn wind chorale in the final movement, this mighty work has been given epithets such as “Symphony of Faith" or "Catholic". And the symphony's focus on the finale and its powerful shift into a hymn-like idiom does indeed give it a touch of the sublime. Names such as “Tragic" and "Faustian" symphony also were suggested, but Bruckner himself described the Fifth as “Fantastic" and his "contrapuntal masterpiece”. In Bamberg, Christian Thielemann will lead his musicians through the complex score of this poignant musical cosmos – of which Hugo Wolf once said, "These are all sounds from other worlds, unfathomable mysteries."