Piano Concerts

Chopin: Sonate H-Moll op. 58

Mozart: Andante aus der Sonate D-Dur KV 576

Prokofiev: Sonate B-Dur op.83

This concert series serves as a tribute to Mozart, who gave a concert with his sister Nannerl in Nymphenburg Palace with Elector Maximilian III when he was seven years old and this went down in history.

Mozart: Sonate C-Dur KV 330

Brahms: Sonate F-Moll op. 5

Chopin: Ballade F-Moll op. 49

This concert series serves as a tribute to Mozart, who gave a concert with his sister Nannerl in Nymphenburg Palace with Elector Maximilian III when he was seven years old and this went down in history.

Classical masterpieces from Mozart to Beethoven, Chopin, Debussy and Ravel.

This concert series serves as a tribute to Mozart, who gave a concert with his sister Nannerl in Nymphenburg Palace with Elector Maximilian III when he was seven years old and this went down in history.

Classical masterpieces from Mozart to Beethoven, Chopin, Debussy and Ravel.

This concert series serves as a tribute to Mozart, who gave a concert with his sister Nannerl in Nymphenburg Palace with Elector Maximilian III when he was seven years old and this went down in history.

Händel: Suite D-Dur HWV 437

Beethoven: Sonate A-Dur op. 101

Mozart: Sonate C-Moll KV 457

Chopin: Ballade F-Moll op. 49

This concert series serves as a tribute to Mozart, who gave a concert with his sister Nannerl in Nymphenburg Palace with Elector Maximilian III when he was seven years old and this went down in history.

Mozart: Variationen KV 300e

Schubert: Sonate D 845

Chopin: Barcarolle op. 60

This concert series serves as a tribute to Mozart, who gave a concert with his sister Nannerl in Nymphenburg Palace with Elector Maximilian III when he was seven years old and this went down in history.

Classical masterpieces from Mozart to Beethoven, Chopin, Debussy and Ravel.

This concert series serves as a tribute to Mozart, who gave a concert with his sister Nannerl in Nymphenburg Palace with Elector Maximilian III when he was seven years old and this went down in history.

Mozart: Overture from Don Giovanni
Beethoven: Symphony No. 5 in C minor “Fate” – Allegro con brio
Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 4 in G major
Dvořák: From the New World – Suite

Residence Soloists
 

In the golden shimmer of the Rococo Cuvilliés Theatre, the evening begins with a musical thunderclap. The overture to Don Giovanni by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart bursts into the hall with those Dantean, shattering chords that foreshadow the ominous appearance of the “Stone Guest,” before plunging into a restless, almost demonic Allegro. In just a few minutes, it captures the entire dramatic spectrum of the opera, balancing tragedy and comedy with remarkable intensity.

Mozart was also a master of working under pressure. Legend has it that he wrote the overture during the night before the premiere in Prague in 1787, while his wife Constanze kept him awake with punch and stories. The copyists received the score only the next morning, and the orchestra had to perform the demanding piece that very evening almost straight from the page.

The first movement of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony in C minor follows with what is perhaps the most famous musical motif in history: the iconic four-note figure that dominates the entire movement. From this tiny musical cell grows a vast surge of sound, charged with extraordinary tension and energy. The nickname “Fate Symphony” is said to come from Beethoven’s secretary Anton Schindler, who claimed that Beethoven described the opening motif with the words: “Thus fate knocks at the door.” Ironically, the premiere in 1808 was something of a disaster: the audience shivered in the unheated Theater an der Wien, and the orchestra struggled through an exhausting program that lasted nearly four hours.

Quite different in character is Beethoven’s Fourth Piano Concerto in G major, one of the most poetic and introspective works of his output. Instead of beginning with a powerful orchestral statement, the concerto opens quietly and unexpectedly: the piano alone introduces gentle, lyrical chords, as if the music were emerging from a private thought. Only afterwards does the orchestra respond, reversing the traditional relationship between soloist and ensemble. At the premiere Beethoven himself played the solo part, although his hearing was already severely deteriorating; it would be his final appearance as a soloist with orchestra. Contemporary accounts describe how he played with such physical intensity that he knocked the candleholders off the piano during an expansive gesture. Choirboys rushed in to hold the candles, only to be pushed aside again at the next entrance, provoking laughter in the audience. Beethoven, however, reacted angrily: after only a few bars he stopped the orchestra and began the movement again from the start.

The program concludes with music by Antonín Dvořák from his famous Symphony No. 9 “From the New World.” Composed during his time in the United States in the 1890s, the work reflects Dvořák’s fascination with the sounds and musical traditions he encountered there, from African American spirituals to Native American melodies. Yet the symphony also carries a deep sense of homesickness for his native Bohemia. The suite drawn from this symphony highlights some of its most memorable moments: expansive melodies, vibrant rhythms, and the famous Largo with its hauntingly beautiful English horn solo.

Together these works form a concert rich not only in musical brilliance but also in stories: of overnight inspiration, chaotic premieres, and the passionate temperament of some of history’s greatest composers.

Scarlatti: Sonate K35

Chopin: op. 69 Nr. 2, op. 34 Nr. 3

Mozart: Sonate B-Dur KV 333

Schumann: Waldszenen op. 82

This concert series serves as a tribute to Mozart, who gave a concert with his sister Nannerl in Nymphenburg Palace with Elector Maximilian III when he was seven years old and this went down in history.

Mozart: Sonate KV281

Liszt: Sonate H-Moll

Chopin: Valse brillante op. 18

This concert series serves as a tribute to Mozart, who gave a concert with his sister Nannerl in Nymphenburg Palace with Elector Maximilian III when he was seven years old and this went down in history.