Audience Academy

The Audience Academy offers unusual insights into the festival program, takes a closer look at works or introduces composers in workshop concerts. Artists and audience meet each other in an informal setting. The Audience Academies last approx. 60 minutes each and there is no break. The event will be held in German language.

Monday 31.7, 02.02 p.m. – VERDO Concert Hall
Two Past Two | Audience Academy I: Keys and Sounds – Exploring Mozart's Piano Music
Alexander Melnikov – Piano
Tickets online

Alexander Melnikov is one of the most exciting personalities in the piano world. He studied in the spirit of the German-Russian school of Heinrich Neuhaus, instructed by Lew Naumow, and thus became one of the leading interpreters of Prokofiev's sonatas. In his trio with violinist Isabelle Faust and cellist Jean-Guihen Queyras he has likewise become a specialist for historical performance and instruments. In the Audience Academy he opens a window onto the keyboard sounds and performance techniques that Mozart grew up with.

Wednesday 2.8, 02.02 p.m. – VERDO Concert Hall
Two Past Two | Audience Academy II: Musical Moments – Thoughts about the "nice passages" in music
Jörg Widmann – Music History Live
Tickets online

The clarinetist and composer Jörg Widmann takes the audience on a guided tour of his perception of dissonances and "nice passages", or nice passages of dissonances, in the history of music. His compositions are known and valued as bold reflections on what is contemporary, without ever forfeiting their reference to that which is eternal. Consequently, this popular musical personality is a perfect reflection of the Summer Festival's own self-image, dedicated as it is to both innovation and tradition.

Thursday 3.8, 02.02 p.m. – VERDO Concert Hall
Two Past Two | Audience Academy III: A Closer Look at the Quintet – Mozart's String Quintet for Two Violins, Two Violas and Cello KV 515
Tomoko Akasaka – Viola
Kuss Quartett – String Quartet
Oliver Wille – Moderation
Tickets online

Mozart's chamber music for strings with a second viola – at this year's Festival with its "Hi.Mozart" motto, the Kuss Quartet decided not to examine the quartets, but Mozart's seldom performed string quintets instead. Oliver Wille has been taking a closer look at quartets ever since the Beethoven Festival in 2018. This time it's a closer look at the quintet, focusing on the beauty and the mystery of selected passages.

Friday 4.8, 02.02 p.m. – VERDO Concert Hall
Two Past Two | Audience Academy IV: Composer Mark Andre (including a performance of his Sieben Stücke für Streichquartett)
Mark Andre – Composition
Kuss Quartett – String Quartet
Ariane Jeßulat – Moderation
Tickets online

Last year, the composer could only attend the Academy via live stream from Paris, Kim Kashkashian concentrated on Brahms instead and there was nonetheless plenty of discussion about Mark Andre's work – that's how the Audience Academy and the world premiere of the famous composer's miniature for string quartet went in 2022. In the meantime, the work, commissioned by the Hitzacker Summer Music Festival and teetering as it does on the whispering edge of silence, has grown to encompass seven movements, all of which are technically an enormous challenge to the Kuss Quartet. In conversation with Professor Ariane Jessulat from the Berlin University of the Arts, the composer will share insights into his work with the interested Academy audience.