events

Luciano Berio, handwritten page from Una melodia di Gustav Mahler. Note sull’”Andante” della Sesta Sinfonia (in Colloque International Gustav Mahler, Paris 1986, pp. 108-115: 110, now in Luciano Berio, Scritti sulla musica, edited by A.I. De Benedictis, Torino, Einaudi 2013, p. 150).

Between April and June 2015 are scheduled several concerts featuring Luciano Berio’s music. The following is a selection of the most outstanding events (for the full list see the Concert calendar).

A-ronne will be performed by vocal ensemble SoloVoices in Basel (April 23). The same day Rendering is scheduled in Västerås, with the Västerås Sinfonietta conducted by Julian Kuerti.
The Folk Songs will be performed both in St. Andrews by Tania Holland Williams and the St. Andrews New Music Ensemble (April 24), and at the Luxembourg Philharmonie, with Cristina Branco and the Orchestre Philharmonique du Luxembourg conducted by Peter Rundel (May 8).
In the frame of Acht Brücken in Cologne is scheduled Passaggio, with soprano Julia Henning, the Kölner Vokalsolisten and the Ensemble intercontemporain, conducted by Pablo Heras-Casado (May 9).
Sinfonia is performed at the Maison de Radio France by Neue Vocalsolisten Stuttgart and the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, conducted by Pascal Rophé (May 23).
In the Staatstheater Kassel’s concert season are scheduled seven performances of Un re in ascolto, with Alexander Hannemann as conductor and Paul Esterhazy as stage director (May 23 - July 25).

The CSLB announces with great happiness that a street has been named after Luciano Berio in a new Milan development being built in what used to be the Fiera area, called City Life. Via Luciano Berio is in a pedestrian area in the heart of the new neighborhood, and it flows into a piazza named after Elsa Morante; for plans of the area click here. An analogous street which will also flow into Piazza Morante will be dedicated to Italo Calvino. This musical and literary "crossing" was proposed by Filippo del Corno, Culture Minister of the City of Milan, and described to the press: "A writer and a composer who both had a special relationship with the city of Milan are remembered for their innovative view towards the future, and concern for the development of the city"; for the complete article click here.

Via Berio and Piazza Morante were inaugurated on Saturday, November 8th at 11:30 am, with a ceremony that took place in a pavilion erected on the piazza especially for the occasion. The greeting remarks by Filippo del Corno, Giorgio Lazzaro (Director of City Life) and Talia Pecker Berio were alternated with a selection from Luciano Berio’s Duetti played by the young violinists of the Conservatory of Milan, prepared and directed by Giovanna Polacco. The ceremony was concluded in front of the uncovered plate of the new street with a further homage to Berio: a surprise performance of a Bartók Duet by the entire group.
For a selection of Press clips click here.
For a photo gallery click here.
For the text of Talia Pecker Berio’s speech click here.

The 2015 concert season around the world features many concerts with Luciano Berio's music. The following is a selection of events scheduled from January to March 2015 (for the full program see the Concert Calendar).

Workwithinwork, the choreography created by William Forsythe on Berio’s Duetti per due violini is scheduled in Switzerland, featuring the Ballet Zürich: nine performances are planned at the Opernhaus, Zurich, between January and June; and on February 25, 27 and 28 also in Winterthur.
On January 31, Voci is scheduled in Düsseldorf, with Christian Lindberg conducting violist Nils Mönkemeyer and the Düsseldorfer Symphoniker.
On February 1st Sequenza VIII for solo violin will be performed by Sergej Krilov at Teatro della Pergola, Florence.
On March 1st in Lugano is scheduled Ofaním's swiss première, featuring Heike Möhlen, the Ensemble 900 and Coro Clairière of Conservatorio della Svizzera Italiana conducted by Arturo Tamayo, with the sound projection by Tempo Reale; in the same concert are scheduled also the performances of O King and Thema (Omaggio a Joyce). On March 6 Siete Canciones populares españolas by De Falla-Berio are planned in Lugano, with Pablo González conducting Luisa Castellani and the Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana.
On March 29 Ricorrenze for flute, oboe, clarinet, horn and bassoon will be performed in Paris featuring the soloists of Ensemble Intercontemporain.

Fall 2014 features many performances with Luciano Berio's music; the following is a selection of the most outstanding events.
Puccini’s Turandot with the Finale composed by Luciano Berio in 2001 will be performed at the Opéra de Nice between the 12th and 19th of November, with Roland Böer conducting and Federico Grazzini as stage director.
On November 13 Emilio Pomarico will conduct Coro at the Teatro Colón, Buenos Aires with the Buenos Aires Philarmonic Orchestra and the choir Diapasón Sur.

Berio’s Duetti for two violins feature in two different frameworks of the Paris Festival d’Automne. On November 22, 26 and December 6 a selection of the Duetti will be juxtapositioned to excerpts from Macé’s Ambidextre and Stockhausen’s Kontakte in a creative mosaic performed by students of the Rameau middle school of Versailles directed by Christophe Junivart. 
Workwhitinwork, William Forsythe’s famous interpretation of Berio’s Duetti, will be performed in Paris (November 17-26) and in other venues and dates by the Ballet de l’Opéra de Lyon within the “Portrait” of the American choreographer featured by the Festival d’Automne.
On November 16 Juraj Valčuha conducts the Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della RAI and violist Antoine Tamestit in Voci (Philharmonie, Cologne).
For the complete calendar of the performances of Berio’s music click here.
On October 18 and 19 Radio Classica broadcasted the program «Note d’autore, a tu per tu con i compositori d’oggi», entirely devoted to Luciano Berio. An extended interview with Angela Ida De Benedictis, editor of Berio’s Scritti sulla musica published by Einaudi in 2013, approaches the composer’s writings and is intersected with excerpts from his music. The program can be listened in podcast on the Soundcloud channel of Radio Classica.
In October 2014 the finnish label Ondine released a new CD with Hannu Lintu conducting the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra in Sinfonia, Quattro versioni originali della "Ritirata Notturna di Madrid di L. Boccherini" and Calmo, with the participation of mezzo-soprano Virpi Räisänen.

Saturday, 18 October at 12 am Radio Classica dedicates to Luciano Berio the program “Note d’autore”. The broadcast features an interview with Angela Ida De Benedictis, editor of Berio’s writings recently issued by Einaudi Luciano Berio, Scritti sulla musica and can be listened to in streaming on Sunday, 19 October at 11 pm, and thereafter in podcast on the Soundcloud channel of Radio classica.
A new production of Puccini’s Turandot with the Finale composed by Luciano Berio in 2001 is being produced by the Opéra de Nice between the 12th and 19th of November, with Roland Böer conducting and Federico Grazzini as stage director.
On November 13 a much attended performance of Coro will take place at the Teatro Colón, Buenos Aires with Emilio Pomarico conducting the Buenos Aires Philarmonic Orchestra and the choir Diapasón Sur.
Berio’s Duetti for two violins feature in two different frameworks of the Paris Festival d’Automne. On November 22, 26 and December 6 a selection of the Duetti will be juxtapositioned to excerpts from Macé’s Ambidextre and Stockhausen’s Kontakte in a creative mosaic performed by students of the Rameau middle school of Versailles directed by Christophe Junivart.
Workwhitinwork, William Forsythe’s famous interpretation of Berio’s Duetti, will be performed in Paris (November 17-26) and in other venues and dates by the Ballet de l’Opéra de Lyon within the “Portrait” of the American choreographer featured by the Festival d’Automne.

For the complete calendar of the current and forthcoming performances of Berio’s music click here.

On Luciano Berio’s birthday (he would have been 89 on the 24th of October). To mark this anniversary we have chosen a precious audio document discovered during our constant search of materials related to the composer’s life and work. It is a long radio interview conducted by Glenn Glasow in July 1962 for the KPFA radio station in Berkeley. In it, Berio – not yet 37 years old – talks extensively about his poetics and composing methods, about the influence of the social-economic scene on musical life and on some of his key works at that time, such as Circles and Tempi concertati.

On this occasion, we are pleased to share with you some recent news concerning the editorial and research activities of the Centro Studi. 
A new edition of Incontri Musicali - the short-lived yet epoch-making journal founded and edited by Luciano Berio between 1956 and 1960 – is forthcoming, edited by Angela Ida De Benedictis, from the Milanese publisher Archinto. The four issues of the journal will appear in a box along with a facsimile anthology of the program booklets of the series of concerts, “Concerti degli Incontri Musicali,” that were performed in various Italian venues in the same years.
A collection of Luciano Berio’s interviews, edited by Vincenzina C. Ottomano, is under way. The book will anthologize a vast number of interviews published in newspapers, magazines, journals and miscellaneous volumes between the 1950’s and 2003 and will offer a lively portrait of the composer, his ideas, his life and his music within the cultural, social and political context of his time. This will be the third volume of Berio’s writings – a project directed by Talia Pecker Berio for the Italian publisher Einaudi – following Un ricordo al futuro: Lezioni americane (the Italian version of the Norton lectures Remembering the Future published in 2006) and Scritti sulla musica (2013).

Luciano and Talia Pecker Berio in the Felsenreitschule, Cronaca del Luogo, Salzburger Festspiele, 1999.

© Günther Sturm

The world première of Cronaca del Luogo, Luciano Berio’s last music-theatre work, with a text by Talia Pecker Berio, inaugurated the Salzburg Festival on the 24th of July 1999. We wish to celebrate this date with documents, photos and excerpts from a radio interview with the composer and his wife, which was conducted by Michele dall’Ongaro and broadcast by the RAI Radio 3 in the days prior to the performance.
Next month we shall mark the 30th anniversary of yet another seminal music-theatre work by Luciano Berio - Un re in ascolto, which had its world première in the Salzburg in 1984 under the baton of Lorin Maazel whose recent passing is a huge loss for the musical community across the planet. We wish to honor his memory and to remember his life-long friendship and many significant musical encounters with Luciano Berio.

For the documents on Cronaca del Luogo, click here.

On August 23 the Lucerne Festival 2014 dedicated its sixth symphonic concert to an exceptional performance of Luciano Berio’s Coro conducted by Sir Simon Rattle. Along with the chorus conductor James Wood, Rattle prepared the young talents – 40 singers and 43 players from all over the world – who were selected to form the choir and orchestra or the 11th edition of the Lucerne Festival Academy that was founded by Pierre Boulez in 2004. For a selection of photos from the rehearsals and performance of Coro in Lucerne click here.
The encounter between the director of the Berliner Philharmoniker (with whom he had given a memorable performance of Coro in 2010), James Wood (who had directed the choir also in Berlin) and the young musicians turned into a true laboratory leading to a musical and human experience that rendered justice to the spirit of Berio’s work, which he had compared to a «plan for an imaginary city, which is realized on different levels and generates, assembles and unifies different things and persons, revealing their individual and collective characters, their distance, their relationships and conflicts within real and virtual borders.» (For Berio’s note on Coro click here; for the synoptic entry click here).
The concert will be broadcast on BR-Klassik on September 11 at 8pm. For listening in streaming click here. For the concert program click here.