Slovene Philharmonic Orchestra

Gustav Mahler's Symphony No.8, performed by the Zagreb and Slovene Philharmonic Orchestras together with 21 Croatian and Slovene choirs. The concert took place in 2011 on the square in front of the Slovene Philharmonic as the opening event of the Festival Ljubljana.

The Slovene Philharmonic Orchestra is part of the music institution Slovene Philharmonic. One of the leading symphonic orchestras in Central Europe, it traces its illustrious heritage back to the beginning of the 18th century.

The orchestra ended the 2010–2011 season with two extraordinary performances: it accompanied Sting who presented his Symphonicity at the Arena Stožice hall (with Sarah Hicks as a conductor), and presented together with Zagreb Philharmonic Orchestra (with Valerij Gergijev as a conductor), accompanied by 21 choirs from Slovenia and Croatia, the Symphony No. 8 by Gustav Mahler at the Congress Square in Ljubljana.

History

The Academia Philharmonicorum (1701) and the Philharmonic Society (1794) were the forerunners of the first Slovene Philharmonic Society which was founded in 1908. The society's orchestra reached an impressive standard under the leadership of Czech conductor Václav Talich, however following Talich's departure its activity declined in the period between the two world wars. The orchestra was re-established in 1947 and was thereafter led by many renowned conductors, among them Bogo Leskovic, Samo Hubad, Oskar Danon, Lovro Matačić, Uroš Lajovic, Milan Horvat, and from 1995 through to 2004 Marko Letonja. From 2005 until 2008 the orchestra was led by American conductor George Pehlivanian, who became the first foreign conductor of the orchestra, followed by the French conductor Emmanuel Villaume (2008–2013) and then by the Canadian conductor Keri-Lynn Wilson (2013–2015). Uroš Lajovic was a conductor for 2 years (2015–2017), then Philipp von Steinaecker (2019–2020).

Programme

The Slovene Philharmonic Orchestra performs nearly 40 subscription concerts in the Gallus Hall at Cankarjev dom Culture and Congress Centre per year (it covers two subscription concert series, named by the colours orange and blue). It prepares also concerts on special occasions (a New Year's concert, tours, national celebrations) and musical matinees for young audiences. The Orchestra also has over 40 CD recordings to its credit.

Orchestra plays predominantly standard repertoire of classical music, reaching from classical masters to the great composers of 20th century. It is known for the performances of Slavic music (Dvořák, Tchaikovsky) and monumental symphonic opus of Gustav Mahler. Each year they perform also new pieces by Slovene contemporary composers.

International cooperation

From the late 1970's on, Slovene Philharmonic have toured Europe, USA and Japan many times. During those tours they played in some of the most prestigious venues, as Carnegie Hall (New York City) and Musikverein (Vienna). They played in many musical centres (Vienna, Rome, Florence, Salzburg, Venice, Zurich, Bern, Geneva, Brussels, Madrid, St Petersburg, Moscow, Bucharest, Birmingham), and has also performed at many great international festivals (Wiener Festwochen, Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, Prague Summer, Warsaw Autumn, Dubrovnik Summer Festival, Varaždin Baroque Evenings festival).

Guest performers have included many world-famous artists, including conductors Rudolf Barshai, Serge Baudo, Jiří Bělohlávek, Theodor Guschlbauer, Leopold Hager, Hartmut Haenchen, Heinz Holliger, Dmitri Kitajenko, Carlos Kleiber, Paul Kletzki, Zubin Mehta, Riccardo Muti, Kurt Sanderling, Simone Young and the best Slovene and foreign soloists including Irena Grafenauer, Marjana Lipovšek, Igor Ozim, Dubravka Tomšič-Srebotnjak, Bernarda Fink, Arthuro Benedetti Michelangeli, Boris Berezovsky, Lazar Berman, Sarah Chang, Till Felner, David Garrett, Håkan Hardenberger, Heinz Holliger, Sharon Kam, Zoltán Kocsis, Stephen Kovacevich, Gidon Kremer, Elisabeth Leonskaja, Schlomo Mintz, Anne-Sophie Mutter, Luciano Pavarotti, Ivo Pogorelić, Dezsö Ranki, Vadim Repin, Mstislav Rostropovich, Svjatoslav Richter, Grygory Sokolov, Alexander Toradze and Julian Rachlin.

External links

Slovene Philharmonic Orchestra web page

Gallery

A joint concert by the Slovene Philharmonic Orchestra and the Zagreb Philharmonic Orchestra, held at Kongresni trg as the opening concert of the Ljubljana Festival, 2016