“A full, round tone, as if Oistrach were on the stage,” raved the critic from the Tagesspiegel at Christian Tetzlaff’s philharmonic debut in June 1995. The young violinist had impressed with Bartók’s Second Violin Concerto. Whenever in the following years Tetzlaff gave a guest performance with the Berliner Philharmoniker, he was the man for the violin concerti of the 20th century and for new music: Béla Bartók, Alban Berg, Unsuk Chin. But this time he’s showing his romantic side. The Violin Concerto in E minor, which Felix Mendelssohn composed in the years 1838-44 for his friend the violinist Ferdinand David, captivates with far-reaching, extensive and cantabile melodies and a formal structure that breaks with the conventions of the classical concerto.

Sir Simon Rattle and the Berliner Philharmoniker then continue the 2013 Waldbühne concert with Beethovenʼs Ninth Symphony, whose famous choral finale successfully resolves the musical conflicts which precede it: “Just as Dante allows us to descend into the depths of Hell to then afford us a ravishing vision of the supreme consolation of Paradise,” as the publication Cäcilia wrote in its 32nd edition in 1828, “so here, Beethoven begins his account which he then intensifies, culminating in the fiery universal hymn of joy.” Writing about a performance a year earlier in which the young Mendelssohn had “commanded the respect of his fellow first violinists”, the reviewer of the Berliner Allgemeinen Musikalische Zeitung remarked, “What can I tell you about this brilliant, gigantic work by this musical hero who continues to grow in stature? It moved us all deeply!”