The opening of the Air series, one of the Five Elements of the Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra’s new season, is scheduled on Friday, 6 October (Kolarac, 8pm). Under the baton of Daniel Raiskin, the orchestra will reveal what air sounds like through the works of Mendelssohn, Webern, and Tchaikovsky, while violinist Antje Weithaas will join the orchestra for Brahms’ Violin concerto.

In profoundly diverse was, air is portrayed in Mendelssohn’s fantastical A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Webern’s colourful Im Sommerwind and Tchaikovsky’s passionate The Tempest. A frequent guest of the Belgrade Philharmonic, Daniel Raiskin will be the orchestra’s Principal Guest Conductor as of the season 2017/18. He claims that air is the most difficult to emulate of all elements of the nature:

“We are performing a beautifully balanced and skilfully compiled programme with a specific theme. In addition to the pieces that have air as their common denominator, we will also play Brahms’ Violin concerto, together with fantastic Antje Weithaas, the genuine representative of the German musical tradition. This composition includes the famous oboe solo in the second movement, where the Belgrade Philharmonic oboist will have to breathe in a lot of air to do it right”, said Daniel Raiskin.

Brahms’ concerto was once described as unplayable, and the difficulty of the solo part caused it to be labelled as the concerto “against the violin”. Hailed as one of the greatest violinists of our time, Antje Weithaas’ musical individuality and technical mastery will make this piece shine in all its glory.