Leipzig's importance in music history is well known. The city of the Thomaskantors and the Gewandhaus has been home to Germany's oldest conservatory since 1843. For Felix Draeseke it became the first outstanding station of his musical career. As a conservatory student enthusiastic about Wagner's new ideas, he aroused the disapproval of his teachers, but found an energetic supporter in Franz Brendel, the editor-in-chief of the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik.

From Leipzig, Draeseke's name spread throughout the musical world, initially primarily as a music critic. When Draeseke returned to Germany after his long stay in Switzerland, he settled in Dresden, but he found his most important publisher in Leipzig: about half of his works appeared with Fr. Kistner. Leipzig is much, so also a Draeseke city. Therefore, the International Draeseke Society is pleased to be able to organize this concert in Leipzig on the occasion of the 110th anniversary of his death.

We also want to commemorate another anniversary: 200 years ago, in 1823, Theodor Kirchner was born, a great master of small forms. In 1843, he became the first student at the conservatory that had just been founded by Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy. Many years later, in the 1880s, he was Draeseke's colleague at the Dresden Conservatory.

On this evening, pianist Aris Alexander Blettenberg, winner of the International Beethoven Piano Competition Vienna 2021, will lead the audience through a program that is as musically rich as it is illuminating in terms of music history, leading from Mozart and Haydn to Schubert and Beethoven, and finally to Schumann, Kirchner and Draeseke.

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Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791)

Prelude and Fugue in C major KV 394

Joseph Haydn (1732-1809)

Sonata in F major Hob.XVI:23

Franz Schubert (1797-1828)

Sonata in A flat major/Es major D 557

Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827)

Alla Ingharese quasi un Capriccio op. 129

PAUSE

Theodor Kirchner (1823-1903)

Caprices op. 27 No. 1-3

Robert Schumann (1810-1856)

Arabesque op. 18

Felix Draeseke (1835-1913)

Sonata quasi fantasia op. 6

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