Rare performance of Bach’s complete solo keyboard concertos with the Berliner Barock Solisten (Baroque Ensemble of the Berlin Philharmonic) and pianist Alexandros Kapelis
Barbican Hall, Tuesday 25 March
Alexandros Kapelis with musicians from Berliner Barock Solisten c. Rainer Maillard
The Berliner Barock Solisten and pianist Alexandros Kapelis come together to perform all six of Bach’s concertos for solo keyboard and orchestra in an extraordinary concert at London’s Barbican Centre on Tuesday 25 March. A tour-de-force for soloist and ensemble alike, this is a rare opportunity for the audience hear these masterpieces in one evening.
Very few ensembles specialising in early music display a level of artistic mastery akin to that of the Berliner Barock Solisten. Comprised of prominent members of the Berliner Philharmonic Orchestra, the musicians have created a unique approach to performing works of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Their flexibility and homogeneity have elicited worldwide acclaim from both public and press. The ensemble’s activities are documented on a rich discography with Deutsche Grammophon, EMI and other leading labels.
They are joined by the dynamic and acclaimed virtuoso Alexandros Kapelis, making his Barbican debut in this concert. Martha Argerich describes him as a pianist who ‘plays the classics with astonishing taste’. Kapelis’s performance of these works by Bach was also described by conductor Christian Thielemann as ‘art at its very greatest made to seem effortless’.
This landmark London date, rescheduled from last year, follows a documentary at Leipzig’s famous Thomaskirche that includes Kapelis and the Berliners performing at the historic site where the Bach lived, worked, and is buried. Further performances in Europe and Asia will follow.
Kapelis and the Berliner Barock Solisten have also recorded the complete set of Bach keyboard concertos with an award-winning production team. This will be the first recording of the entire set of works in nearly two decades and Kapelis joins a highly select handful of pianists to ever release such a collection. It is also the first time the ensemble of the Berlin Philharmonic have recorded this complete set.
Alexandros Kapelis says “The first time I heard this music I was 12. This was on a radio programme in Peru, where I spent part of my childhood. I would have never imagined that one day I would be playing these works with the Berliner Barock Solisten. Collaborating with them on these intimate recordings and performances is a great privilege. They have been chosen from thousands of musicians who dream to be part of the legendary Berlin orchestra, and they bring an incredible level of excellence, discipline and perfection to everything they do.”
Violinist Raimar Orlovsky, from the Berliner Barock Solisten, says “It is a great pleasure to come back to London after more than 14 years for this Barbican concert. This exciting collaboration with pianist Alexandros Kapelis, with his unusual musical empathy and extraordinary clarity, brings us back with the incredible six-keyboard-concerto cycle of Johann Sebastian Bach. For a baroque orchestra it is one of the most important cycles to play besides the six Brandenburg Concertos, Handel’s Concerti Grossi, and Telemann’s Tafelmusik. We hope that the audience enjoys hearing the music as much as we have enjoyed working on it together.”