People came to the Isarphilharmonie to hear mountaineer Reinhold Messner speaking about Richard Strauss’ “Alpine Symphony”. The fact that the Stuttgart Philharmonic played Mozart’s G minor symphony KV 183 beforehand seems like the appearance of an opening act that nobody wants to hear. Conductor Christian Schumann makes every effort to convey precision.
But it’s not enough to coordinate the strings even in the details, and it doesn’t even get through to the horns. Sloppily performed, a Mozart symphony with its delicately composed finesse does not bring any joy.
The “Alpine Symphony” is different. Just the sight of such a podium-filling orchestra is awe-inspiring. And then he comes. Messner, the giant of alpinism – and is a slender, graying man who stands in an unfamiliar role in front of a huge orchestra. The play begins. When Messner gets up at a signal from the conductor and puts his experience of the mountains into words, the music stops or progresses in the background. Photo projections reinforce the impression. If Strauss’ music speaks alone, its associative power can work without images.
This concept actually works extremely well. Because here – intentionally or coincidentally – two equal levels of intensity of the narrative meet. In those moments when Strauss tinkles the cowbells in an unspeakably bold manner, one could lose faith in this work, but Strauss is concerned with much more than postcard kitsch. About sublimity, about the inner experience, even more: about this worldly existentialism – this work is inspired by Nietzsche. And this is where Strauss and Messner meet. Messner’s alpinism is not a Sunday hike on the Breitenstein. “We voluntarily go where we can perish so as not to perish.” Messner is a real counterpart for Strauss.