Women making waves

There is hardly a musical personality in the field of classical music who is as well-known in the German-language region as Anne-Sophie Mutter. Her enormous talent allowed her to climb the career ladder at breakneck speed; her technique, musicality and curiosity brought her into contact with the most important personalities and institutions around the globe. Any kind of pigeon-holing is anathema to her; John Williams composes for her, as does Jörg Widmann. As a mature and committed artist, effective and sustainable support for young musicians is an issue dear to her heart, and she offers this mainly through her own foundation and the ensemble Mutter’s Virtuosi. She has always taken a clear stand on world events: she raised her voice in protest against the misery which gripped the music sector during the Covid-19 pandemic and has given several benefit concerts for the victims of the war of aggression against Ukraine. Together with the young cellist Pablo Ferrández, Mutter recently recorded Brahms’ Double Concerto for CD – at the Philharmonie Luxembourg, this fruitful collaboration can now be experienced live on 14.11., accompanied by the London Philharmonic Orchestra under Edward Gardner.

In addition to her outstanding virtuosity, it has always been her curiosity and open-mindedness towards her surroundings and technical innovation which ensured that Julia Fischer is equally popular among cognoscenti and classical novices – regardless of generation boundaries! Her JF Club was the first music platform owned by an artist in the classical market. For a long time, she was the youngest professor at a German music academy, and the exceptional artist is still passionately interested in music education – for example as a co-founder of the «Kindersinfoniker», a string orchestra consisting entirely of young and very young musicians. The «Kapellsolistin», an honour bestowed upon her by the Sächsische Staatskapelle, now comes to Luxembourg for two evenings with that orchestra from Dresden, performing the work of a former child prodigy – Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy’s Violin Concerto – as well as the masterful Violin Concerto by Ludwig van Beethoven.

Yuja Wang is an artist who feels entirely at home in the 21st century. She likes to be where she is not expected, diverging brilliantly from the paths that seem preordained for her. A child prodigy from a family of musicians, she came to international attention in 2007 when she stepped in at short notice for Martha Argerich. The pianist has acquired a broad repertoire of concerti, sonatas and chamber music works, ranging from Bach to Albéniz, from Gershwin, Fauré and Brahms to Stravinsky. She will interpret works by the latter on Nov. 28 together with her friend and faithful musical partner, the violinist Leonidas Kavakos, before returning to the podium of the Grand Auditorium on March 13, 2023 with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Esa-Pekka Salonen. What would excellence be without curiosity? Every piano performance by Yuja Wang demonstrates that one would be pointless without the other.

Cecilia Bartoli, who was born into a family of musicians and first walked the stage at the age of nine before making her debut a few years later in Il barbiere di Siviglia, garnered the attention of such famous conductors as Daniel Barenboim, Herbert von Karajan and Nikolaus Harnoncourt. The career of the «Diva assoluta» (Les Échos), however, is not limited to vocalism: she is known for her innovative and original projects – earning her the reputation of being the «Indiana Jones» of contemporary music – and has been appointed director of the Opéra de Monte-Carlo, a post she takes up in January, while already leading her faithful Musiciens du Prince-Monaco, an orchestra she founded in 2016. Of course this ensemble accompanies her during the autumn concert, which has become a beloved tradition for the Philharmonie’s audience. On Nov. 30, she invites listeners to a grand opera evening, featuring a concert performance of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s La clemenza di Tito, a work with fascinating arias in which the mezzo-soprano will once again display the «enchanting textures» (Le Temps) of her voice. There must be a reason this diva bears the name of the patron saint of music…