As a conductor, François-Xavier Roth has established himself as a champion of twentieth and twenty-first century music, an intelligent, observant interpreter whose readings are rarely beholden to tradition; part of what makes him such a persuasive ambassador for the modern repertoire is his knack for creating an intriguing concert programme. For his guest appearance at this year’s Musikfest, he led the Berlin Philharmonic through an evening assembled from sources as diverse as Debussy, Stravinsky, Zimmermann and Ligeti. If there was no obvious conceptual thread tying the pieces together, the mere proximity of these distinct voices made for an evening rich in sonic cross-reference and unexpected affinities.
Even Stravinsky’s brief, agreeable Symphonies of Wind Instruments, which served as an overture to the evening, offered some hints as…
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