When the year is close to the end one can hear numerous orchestras rehearse elegant three quarter time or lively gallop beat, however, for sure music in high champagne spirits. Alfred Eschwé, renowned as an exquisite expert of the brilliant music by Strauß & Co., always has the busiest time around the change of the years. As final notes for 2015 and as off-beat for 2016 he rehearses again the New Year’s programme of the Tonkünstler Orchestra which will be played at the Vienna Musikverein, the St. Pölten’s Festival Hall and numerous towns throughout Lower Austria. Alfred Eschwé himself takes the lead for more than 10 of these concerts.

Maestro Eschwé this time also refers to an upcoming opera premiere under his baton in March 2016 by focussing part of the concert programme on Russian dances combined with the Gold and Silver music by Suppé, Strauß and Lehár. For the first time in his career Eschwé will conduct Alexander Borodin’s peoples’ drama Prince Igor at the Vienna Volksoper. The Polovtsian Dances from this opera can already be heard in the Tonkünstler New Year’s concerts, next to works by Shostakovich and Rubinstein. You can find a teaser for this part of the programme among this artist’s audio-files on our webpage: a furious gallop by Khachaturian