Bayerisches Staatsorchester / Vilde Frang / Vladimir Jurowski

»I wanted for once to compose just as the cow gives milk,« Strauss once joked about his »An Alpine Symphony«. The mammoth work depicts a full mountain hike, complete with summit cross, thunderstorm and, yes, alpine pastures and cow’s bells. The composer’s admiration for the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche also shines through.

With his virtuosic treatment of the orchestra, Strauss makes direct reference to Richard Wagner, whose overture to the opera »Tristan und Isolde« opens the concert. The latter injected so much heart and soul into the music that he feared it might drive people insane. And positioned between those two works is Alban Berg’s moving Violin Concerto »To the Memory of an Angel«, one of the most personal pieces of music ever written.