An after thought... Friede auf erden (21st and 22nd April 2023, 19:00, Gent / Antwerpen)

Fri, Apr 21 2023, 19:00 - 20:30h, Opera Gent
Sat, Apr 22, 2023 19:00 - 20:30h, Opera Antwerpen


Here is a clip I just found from when we were rehearsing Fauré’s Les Berceaux for the concert entitled “Friede auf Erden”. We performed this concert the two nights before I had the London Marathon. Immediately after the concert in Antwerp I had to drive to Calais to get the final Eurotunnel crossing to the UK so that I could make it to the start line on time. What an adventure! I remember getting very little sleep that night. 


Anyway in the video, you get a little video, you can get a taster for what it is like for use behind the scenes in the chorus rehearsal room in Opera Antwerpen. This is where the magic all begins!



Choral music by Johannes Brahms, Arnold Schönberg, Fauré, and Hugo Wolf e.a. by the chorus of Opera Ballet Vlaanderen
"It is perfectly possible to compose a peace hymn without believing in eternal peace," Arnold Schönberg reported about 'Friede auf Erden' in 1906. This spellbinding choral work, in which peace figures like a hard-won dream, is accompanied by Johannes Brahms' 'Vier Gesänge, opus 17', in which the women's choir is enveloped in a gloriously romantic sound with horns and harps. Other gems from the German romantic repertoire also make an appearance.
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