A few weeks before it officially begins Bonn Beethoven Festival on Thursday 5 September with the motto “Together”, almost 200 young musicians aged 17 to 27 gathered for rehearsals in the dead of summer in Weikersheim, a small town in the beautiful Tauber Valley of Baden-Württemberg: The German Federal Youth Orchestra and the World Youth Choir, with by 84 lyric singers from 41 countries.

Weikersheim is home to the German branch of Jeunesses Musicales, a global organization that helps young people from all over the world find each other to play music together. The hope of the organization founded in 1945 is that people who play music together don’t later start wars.

Rehearsals for the presentation of two works lasted a week: Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony (Chorus), whose 200th premiere anniversary was celebrated this year, as well as a new work created especially for this year’s Campus Project 2024 by the Chinese composer Tan Dun: the ‘Choral Concerto: Nine’.

“Young people give me more than I give them”

The Chinese composer and master musician, who lives in Shanghai and New York and has won an Oscar for his score to the film ‘Tiger and Dragon’, composed the work after being commissioned by various international organisations, including Deutsche Welle. He attended Weikersheim to conduct final rehearsals for the Ninth Concerto and his own study of Beethoven’s famous choral work.

When almost 200 people between the ages of 17 and 27 meet and the program includes not only rehearsals, but also parties in the evening, it follows that on stage there is a different, more relaxed atmosphere than in the rehearsals of a professional orchestra. Tan Dun spoke to DW in the best words about the young musicians he works with: “The young people give me more than I can give them. They are so calm and peaceful.”

For the Chinese composer, the art of living in peace with each other and with the whole world is the central message of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. A message, which he also wants to promote with his own composition: “For me, Beethoven addresses the spirit, but he also speaks to nature and the universe – to the air, to the rain, to the storms, to the water. My new work is written from the perspective of Mother Earth.

The tour concludes at the Beethoven Festival in Bonn

Beethoven was looking for a suitable text for a long time, until he decided to set Friedrich Schiller’s “Ode to Joy” to music. Tan Dun’s creative path towards “Choral Concerto: Nine” also began with the search for the appropriate text. He chose ancient Chinese lyric poetry, combining words by three important Chinese poets with a selection of Schiller’s verses. Its purpose was a dialogue between the West and the East, which starts already at the level of the text. “This work is completely different from anything I’ve played before,” says violinist Natasha Botsvai: “I think it has a lot of energy and emotion. It’s also almost danceable at points and just very, very fresh!”

After the premiere of the work on August 28, 2024 in the Tauber Philharmonic – Weikersheim’s concert hall – the “Choral Concerto: Nine” was presented as part of a European tour with the Federal Youth Orchestra and the World Choir, with stops in leading concert halls such as Hamburg’s Elbe Philharmonic, Berlin’s Memorial Hall and Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw.

The tour with Beethoven’s Ninth and Tan Dun’s “Choral Concerto: Nine” will conclude on September 7 at the Bonn Beethoven Festival. The concert will be broadcast live by DW on the DW Classical YouTube channel.

Editor: Stefanos Georgakopoulos