“I think it’s very important for artists to be open to contemporary music, because that’s how we can build music history. If we don’t do that, there would not have been Beethoven or Mozart. We have our time and we have to find our music, music that we hope will be sustainable, not just now but into the future.”
Benjamin Appl
INTERVIEW | Benjamin Appl: The Artist And The Teacher
By Joseph So on July 15, 2022
So you will be the witness of time by visiting this historic event in music – World Premiere of “Rhapsody for Baritone and Orchestra” composed David Philip Hefti with a text by Salman Rushdie. The interpreters are baritone Benjamin Appl and conductor Case Scaglione with Württembergisches Kammerorchester (WKO).
Date: Wednesday 21.9.2022
Time: 19:30
Location: Festhalle Harmonie, Heilbronn.
According to the concert catalogue, Hefti is considered a highly sought-after contemporary composer. He has worked with the BR Symphony Orchestra, the DSO Berlin and the Ensemble Modern. Hefti also works as a conductor, in 2013, he received the Composer Prize of the Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation. I am looking forward to listen to his composition for the first time in the coming concert.
Author Salman Rushdie’s novels are prize winners, at the same time put his life at risk. The most recent attack was on 12.8.2022 in western New York state. Not only his life, but also his book translators and publisher were stabbed or shot. The novel – “The Satanic Verses” claimed to be controversial in religion ideas, Rushdie however defensed his books are about “migration, its stresses and transformations” but not anti-religious. (From Rushdie, Salman (22 January 1989). “Choice between light and dark”. The Observer.)
(K)EINE POLITISCHE MUSIK / (Not) Political Music is the theme of the concert. Whether the writers and the artists like it or not, art, literature and politics are often inextricably linked. Other than the World Premiere, we can also hear Beethoven’s Symphony No. 3, which he originally dedicated to Napoleon Bonaparte then he regretted it afterward. The creation of Beethoven’s 3rd symphony shows another kind of relationship between music and politic.
It is worth noting Benjamin Appl performed at an event on 9.11.2021 in Bellevue Palace Berlin to commemorate the proclamation of the republic in 1918, the pogrom night in 1938 and the fall of the Wall in 1989. The guests were the heads of all constitutional bodies including the former chancellor of Germany Angela Merkel.
Indeed, song recital theme on “lest-we-forget” is Appl’s project that he takes closely to heart. At one concert that I attended on 21.3.2019 in Heidelberg, he showed us the dark history of how culture has been misused. We heard Schumann-Heine’s songs lyrics replaced by a new horrible text during Nazi Regime because Heine is a Jew. The second part of the recital, he performed songs composed in Theresienstadt concentration camp. How the victims found comfort in music and kept their faith in God at desperate times is a timeless inspiration to me.
Programme Note (German):
If you have not known about how wonderful are the interpreters, you can visit the links at the end of this blog post. Link to book a concert ticket is also available. I myself have been to several concerts by WKO and Appl separately, I can only recommend them. It is best to attend the concert in person to experience them first hand.
Ticket:
https://wko-heilbronn.reservix.de/p/reservix/event/1926430
Case Scaglione and Württembergisches Kammerorchester:
https://www.wko-heilbronn.de/orchester/
Benjamin Appl:
https://www.benjaminappl.de/about/
Interview Benjamin Appl: The Artist And The Teacher by Joseph So on July 15, 2022
https://www.ludwig-van.com/toronto/2022/07/15/interview-benjamin-appl-artist-teacher/
Salman Rushdie:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/salmanrushdie
Event:
World Premiere of Rhapsody by David Philip Hefti in Heilbronn
September 21 @ 19:30 – 21:30
David Philip Hefti – Rhapsody for baritone and orchestra (world premiere)
with a text by Sir Salman Rushdie
Württembergisches Kammerorchester
Case Scaglione (Conductor)
Benjamin Appl (Baritone)