Slobodeniouk, Goerne, Wiener Singakademie / Shostakovich

The Latvian organist Iveta Apkalna is considered one of the world’s leading instrumentalists. Apkalna will interpret the famous Passacaglia from the opera Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District, the only organ work by Dmitri Shostakovich. Subsequently, the Finnish-Russian conductor Dima Slobodeniouk will direct the Wiener Symphoniker through Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 13. Its first movement is based on the poem “Babi Yar” by the Russian poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko. There, Yevtushenko draws parallels between the Nazi massacre committed in the ravine of Babi Yar in 1941, and the anti-Semitism in the Soviet Union of the 1960s. Along with the gentlemen of the Vienna Singakademie Choir, Matthias Goerne will be one of the most exciting singers of our time to take on the bass solo.