Review: Tonhalle and Jan Willem de Vriend

This week, as the Zurich Tonhalle Orchestra, we performed two wonderful 1.5-hour-long, non-stop concerts consisting only of Bach's works under the direction of the famous Dutch conductor Jan Willem de Vriend.

There are some repertoires in which some ensembles, orchestras and soloists are stronger and weaker. For example, modern music ensembles mainly perform the works of today's composers, but there are also ensembles and performers specialized in the classical and baroque era. There are already many baroque conductors and ensembles in the Netherlands - with De Vriend being of the leading musicians of this school.

Since I started at Tonhalle in August 2021, I had the opportunity to play with him for the second time this week. The Tonhalle Orchestra, where I am currently playing as an interim second concertmaster, already well-versed in all kinds of periods from baroque to contemporary music (for example, we’re having the 1955-born composer Toshio Hosokawa as the artist-in-residence this year). During the rehearsals in chamber orchestra format (we were only seven 1st violins), I realized that we had no difficulty in working with Mr. de Vriend.

Julia Becker, one of our concertmasters, played with the piccolo (small) violin in the Brandenburg Concerto No. 1. I was seeing this instrument for the first time, made by Nicolo Gagliano, one of the most famous luthiers of the 18th century! It was about the size of a 3/4 violin, with plain gut strings tuned one minor third above the modern violin (G-C-F-B-flat, from top-down). As such, the concerto, which was actually F major, was written in D major in the concertmaster party. Julia handled this very successfully - if someone with absolute pitch like me tried to play it, he/she would definitely have a cognitive dissonance! Besides, I'm not even mentionng about the difficulty of playing a 3/4 violin as an adult (at least for someone with big hand like mine).

We also performed the “Organ Concerto”, adapted from Bach's own cantatas and cembalo works (BWV 146, 1052 and 188). In fact, Bach does not have a concerto originally written for organ. Organist Matthias Havinga gave a successful performance of this piece. Of course, this was also one of the rare opportunities to use the ultra-strong, newly made organ in a program during the season at Tonhalle.

Afterwards, we performed “Ich liebe den Höchsten von ganzem Gemüte” (BWV 174) and the Orchestra Suite No. 3 in D Major (BWV 1068). We all enjoyed it so much, that we couldn't sit still towards the end of the concert! I can't speak for all the members of the orchestra, of course, but I can say that it is one of the most enjoyable, educational and unforgettable concerts I have played since I came to Tonhalle, together with Strauss's Alpine Symphony, which we did with Paavo Järvi a few months ago.

The inspiration I got this week will definitely influence my recordings of Telemann Fantasies and Bach Solo Sonatas and Partitas for solo violin in the near future.