CONCERTS IN MUNICH 

‘Well, just die’, the 83-year-old Richard Strauss is said to have replied to a journalist’s question as to what plans he still had for the future. In the shadow, or rather, in the light of his approaching end of life, the master once again created a musical treasure of captivating beauty with the ‘Duett-Concertino’ in 1947: a playful double concerto for clarinet, bassoon, strings and harp – a cheerful farewell, placed in the echo chamber of his own works such as ‘Der Rosenkavalier’ or ‘Ariadne auf Naxos’. The ‘Metamorphoses’, which had been composed a good two years earlier, were different. In the face of the terrible destruction of war and with the feeling that the history of music had also come to an abrupt end, Strauss created elegiac, flowing music for 23 solo strings. This work is characterised by subtle nuances and shades of grey instead of a lavishly dazzling play of colours, at the end of which the funeral march from Beethoven’s ‘Eroica’ is quoted. The only piece that Strauss composed for solo violin, also in 1945, can also be heard: the ‘Daphne’ Etude. With this programme dedicated purely to Richard Strauss’ late works, the MKO and its Associated Conductor Jörg Widmann return to the Sendling Himmelfahrtskirche, which they discovered together as a recording and concert venue during the pandemic, under the title ‘Letzte Gesänge’. As in the celebrated 5th subscription concert in February 2024, Jörg Widmann is also the soloist on the clarinet.