By Catherine Kustanczy<\/p>\n
The Opera Queen (read the full interview)<\/a><\/p>\n There\u2019s really no such thing as a side-project for those who work in the arts; there are only many different aspects of one\u2019s creative self that manifest in various ways, creating an ever-evolving tapestry of expression and experience.<\/p>\n This seems especially true for Philharmonix, a collective made up of members of the Berlin Philharmonic (violinist Noah Bendix-Balgley and cellist Stephan Koncz), the Vienna Philharmonic (bassist \u00d6d\u00f6n R\u00e1cz, clarinetist Daniel Ottensamer, violist Thilo Fechner), pianist Christoph Traxler (who\u2019s performed with the Vienna Chamber Orchestra and the Staatskapelle Halle), and violinist\/vocalist Sebastian G\u00fcrtler (first Concertmaster of the Wiener Volksoper from 1997 to 2008). One could easily label their efforts \u201cgateway\u201d \u2013 but I\u2019m not sure classical music, when done well and presented with so much class and intelligence, requires any real \u201cgateways.\u201d If one is curious, open, broad-minded, and leaves preconceptions at the door, the wonders of the classical world tend to unfurl on their own, no gateways needed. There\u2019s no denying a satisfying integration of entertainment, education, creativity, and chemistry greatly helps, and it\u2019s here that Philharmonix excels. Their 2018 album, The Vienna Berlin Music Club Volume 1 (Deutsche Grammophon), is an eclectic mix of Central and Eastern European sounds, and happily raises a glass to the past while dancing firmly into the future, encouraging audiences to do the same. By turns playful, smart, and brimming with curiosity, it\u2019s a musical fusion for dreaming, and dancing, for cooking, for cleaning, for primping and plying, for smiling, for silence, for living: \u201cl\u2019chaim,\u201d \u201cwillkommen,\u201d \u201crock on,\u201d and \u201cexcelsior,\u201d it seems to say, in so many tones and textures and tempi.<\/p>\n Mental workouts are sewn into the colorful quilts of their creative arrangements; one hears so many, many different sounds from moment to moment. Henry Mancini\u2019s \u201cBaby Elephant Walk\u201d merges playfully with his theme from Peter Gunn; a classy, creative take on Queen\u2019s \u201cBohemian Rhapsody\u201d has snatches of \u201cAva Maria\u201d; their thoughtful \u201cRussian Overture\u201d moves from stately seriousness (with vocals) to a Klezmer-like explosion of energy that references portions of The Nutcracker and Khachaturian\u2019s Sabre Dance. A charming rendition of \u201cFelix Navidad\u201d, with pizzicato strings, breezy piano, and buzzy percussion offers a lovely respite in an album of intense energy and verve; \u201cEnglishman in New York\u201d blends Klezmer, scat, and classical chamber sounds. Then there\u2019s the gorgeous (and for me, wildly familiar) sounds of gypsy in \u201cGnossienne\u201d and \u201cBalkan Party\u201d \u2013 this is the music of my own childhood and cultural background, and I admit to being slightly greedy in the sonic sense of wanting more of it; perhaps their next album (The Vienna Berlin Music Club Volume 2, releasing September 27th through Deutsche Grammophon) will serve that fix, along with a panoply of other delicious sounds.<\/p>\n What makes Philharmonix special is that they provide not only a valuable perspective to what each member does in their respective day jobs (and it\u2019s worth looking into those, because it changes how you perceive their work in important ways) but a very smart way to listen to past and present; you hear classical works differently after spending time really listening to what they do. This is one side project that doesn\u2019t really feel like (much less sound like) a side project at all; its members sound as if they\u2019ve known one another for decades, playing in one another\u2019s living rooms, at one another\u2019s graduations and weddings and bar mitzvahs, in bars and cars and trains and planes. Their curiosity feels much larger than a concert hall, but at the same time their musical understanding is more intimate than the coziest parlour.<\/p>\n That ease and familiarity was underlined in my conversation this past summer with two Philharmonix members. Noah Bendix-Balgley, First Concertmaster of the Berliner Philharmoniker since 2014, and Stephan Koncz, Cello with the Berliner Philharmoniker since 2010, when they were between Philharnonix gigs in rural Austria. While lively and conversational, the pair were were equally blunt in sharing their thoughts on the role this project has playing in influencing the work they do with the Berlin Phil, and vice-versa. The band plays the Wiener Konzerthaus the end of this month, with performances in Dresden, Luxembourg and the U.K. in December.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By Catherine Kustanczy The Opera Queen (read the full interview) There\u2019s really no such thing as a side-project for those who work in the arts; there are only many different aspects of one\u2019s creative self that manifest in various ways, creating an ever-evolving tapestry of expression and experience. This seems especially true for Philharmonix, a … Continued<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":701,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[3655,3660,3659,3656,3658,3657],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.opus3artists.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5210"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.opus3artists.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.opus3artists.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.opus3artists.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.opus3artists.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5210"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.opus3artists.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5210\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5211,"href":"https:\/\/www.opus3artists.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5210\/revisions\/5211"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.opus3artists.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/media\/701"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.opus3artists.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5210"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.opus3artists.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5210"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.opus3artists.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5210"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}