..."Mit Feuerwerk aus blinkendem Blech, mit
aufwühlend emotionalen Orchesterklängen und mit alles überstrahlendem Gottvertrauen."..."Wie er jetzt bei der eröffnenden Feuerwerksmusik von Händel den riesigen Orchesterapparat mit unter anderem neun Hörnern, neun Oboen und sechs Trompeten
vibrierend auf Touren brachte, war eine eigene Show des Dirigenten."...
Olaf Weiden
Ganze RezensionAnd then there was the third concert with Hartmut Haenchen and the Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra playing Handel's Music for the Royal Fireworks followed by Shostakovich's 8th. Strange programming I thought, although the Handel seems to be one of Haenchen's fetish pieces, and ultimately the contrast (between the pieces and their execution) was revelatory.
It was a brilliant concert of impeccable musicianship led by a master, in the wonderful acoustic, the clarity can be emphasised enough, of this special place.
Outstanding.
The Handel (with full orchestra) was forward, bombastic and of course celebratory, if at once pompous and terribly British.
Ganze Rezension...Haenchen led the orchestra in
a gloriously non-filological
and breathtakingly non-historically informed performance of Handel’s music: a joy and a fest for the ears for those who would like to listen to baroque music outside the mainstream dictated by the ayatollah of the performance on period (but modern by any means...) instruments. Didn’t Handel write the Music for the Royal Fireworks for a hugeous band? Thus an orchestra of Brucknerian proportion (but faithful to Handel’s orchestration in contrast with Goossens’ reworking of the Messiah, recorded by Beecham, which would be interesting to bring back to the concert hall) to which the Maarschalkerweerd’s organ of the Concertgebouw hall added an extra symphonic dimension.
Edoardo Saccenti
Ganze Rezension