Opened in 1908, the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires draws on Italian Renaissance and French Beaux-Arts architecture. Its opulent interior offers a striking contrast to the Philharmonie Berlin, which opened just 55 years later: two concert halls shaped by very different ideas of what such a building should be. Beyond the theatre, parts of Buenos Aires also reveal architectural ties to Paris, Madrid and Milan.
For the first concert in Buenos Aires, Kirill Petrenko conducted the Berliner Philharmoniker in Brahms’s Piano Concerto No. 1, with Víkingur Ólafsson as soloist, followed by Richard Strauss’s Also sprach Zarathustra. A Digital Concert Hall team was also on hand, preparing to stream the same programme live and free of charge on Friday, 23 October.
Brahms and Strauss once more for the finale – this time at the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires. Ending the Berliner Philharmoniker’s three-week tour of New York and South America in this magnificent hall was a particular pleasure for the musicians. First concertmaster Daishin Kashimoto said: “You can feel the history of this hall – it’s a joy to play here. And I hope with all my heart that we’ll be back again soon.”