Czech Philharmonic Youth Orchestra • Dvořák Prague Festival

The Spanish cellist Pablo Ferrández, now 32 years old, was destined from birth for a brilliant musical career. Both of his parents were also musicians, and they named their child for the iconic Spanish cellist Pablo Casals. Ferrández soon showed himself to be worthy of the name: he turned out to be a prodigy, making the impression of a “trained” cellist at age three, starting to make public appearances at age nine, and making his debut with the Spanish National Orchestra at age 12. He is said to have been a very disciplined child, and he was unaware of his exceptional nature because he was constantly immersed in his work.

At age 13 he began studying at the prestigious Escuela Superior de Música Reina Sofía under Natalia Shakhovskaya, a student of the great Mstislav Rostropovich, whose interpretive tradition Ferrández is following to a considerable extent. Ferrández then continued his musical education at the Kronberg Academy in Germany. Of course, his musical career would not be where it now is had it not been for two circumstances: victory at the famed Tchaikovsky International Competition (2015) and meeting Anne-Sophie Mutter, who took him under her wing as a scholar of her foundation. That not only put Ferrández in contact with his musical idol, who has since passed on many of her skills to him, but also earned him a large number of opportunities to perform in great concert halls including appearances alongside Anne-Sophie Mutter.

That is also how Ferrández first came to the Rudolfinum last January with Anne-Sophie Mutter, the Czech Philharmonic, and Manfred Honeck, excelling in Brahms’s Double Concerto. And today, we are fortunate to have a live recording of that successful concert. The acclaim was so tempestuous that Pablo Ferrández immediately received the offer to perform here again. He had no idea it would be so soon: already in September he stood in at the opening of the Dvořák Prague Festival in Dvořák’s great Cello Concerto. Despite his youth, he has already played the work on today’s programme countless times, and he included it on his first recording. According to some of the world’s critics, with Dvořák Ferrández has become “a cellist of stature” (The Guardian), and Czech critics have also been unsparing in their praise.

Ferrández and the Czech Philharmonic are taking Dvořák to Japan at the turn of October and November, and he will also be appearing on the March tour of Europe with the Czech Philharmonic in Spain, Germany (on 19 March you can wish him a happy birthday at the concert in Munich), and France. This year, he will get quite a few chances to enjoy the masses of orchestral sound that he loves during his solo appearances: on his busy calendar are several debuts with American orchestras in Boston, Cleveland, San Francisco, Pittsburgh, and other important cities as well as concerts with the already familiar faces of the London Philharmonic Orchestra and the Orchestre National de France. A “New genius of the cello” (Le Figaro), he is conquering the world with his 1689 Stradivarius.

Innovative programs and a passionate commitment to the music of the 20^th century have always been Ingo Metzmacher’s trademark and firmly established him as a leading international conductor.

Recent concert performances include returns to the Berlin Philharmonic, Munich Philharmonic, Bavarian Radio Symphony and BBC Symphony orchestras. He also continues to work closely with the Bamberg Symphony, Vienna Symphony orchestras and the Orchestre de Paris. This autumn he started a series of concerts over two seasons as Conductor in Residence with the New Japan Philharmonic in Tokyo.

His 2013/14 season sees the continuation of Dieter Dorn’s new production of Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen in Geneva. Das Rheingold opened in March 2013 and will be followed by Die Walküre, Siegfried and Götterdämmerung in autumn 2013 and spring 2014, with two complete cycles in May 2014. In the summer of 2013 he returned to the Salzburg Festival for a new production of Sir Harrison Birtwistle’s opera Gawain, directed by Alvis Hermanis. Further appearances at the Salzburg Festival have included the world premiere of Wolfgang Rihm’s opera Dionysos; Prometeo and Al gran sole carico d’amore by Luigi Nono, as well as Bernd Alois Zimmermann’s Die Soldaten. Other opera highlights of recent seasons were The Rake’s Progress and Die tote Stadt at the Royal Opera, Covent Garden; Königskinder, Tristan und Isolde, Der ferne Klang, Tannhäuser, From the House of the Dead, The Nose, and Palestrina at the Zurich Opera House; and Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District and Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny at the Vienna State Opera.

From 2007 to 2010 Metzmacher was Chief Conductor and Artistic Director of the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin. His thematic concert cycles during this time entitled ‘From The German Soul’, ‘Breakthrough 1909’, and ‘Temptation’ made a lasting impact on Berlin’s music life. Previously he had been Chief Conductor of The Netherlands Opera (2005–8) in Amsterdam. Highlights of his tenure included performances of Henze’s The Bassarids, directed by Peter Stein; Die tote Stadt and Die Gezeichneten with the Concertgebouw Orchestra; a cycle of the three Da Ponte operas by Mozart in productions by Jossi Wieler and Sergio Morabito; and a Pierre Audi production of Messiaen’s Saint François d’Assise. As General Music Director of the Hamburg State Opera (1997–2005), he conducted a series of internationally acclaimed productions, many of them in collaboration with stage director Peter Konwitschny. Highlights included Lohengrin, Wozzeck, Freischütz, Don Carlos and Moses und Aron.

Ingo Metzmacher’s discography includes live recordings of his New Year’s Eve concerts in Hamburg from 1999 to 2004, entitled ‘Who is afraid of 20^th Century Music?’; a complete recording of Karl Amadeus Hartmann’s symphonies with the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra; the world premiere of Hans Werner Henze’s Ninth Symphony with the Berliner Philharmoniker; Olivier Messiaen’s Illuminations of the Beyond… with the Vienna Philharmonic; Hans Pfitzner’s Von deutscher Seele with the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, and a live recording of Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk from the Vienna State Opera. Available on DVD are the Salzburg Festival productions of Wolfgang Rihm’s Dionysos and Bernd Alois Zimmermann’s Die Soldaten, the Zurich Opera House production of Engelbert Humperdinck’s Königskinder, Pierre Audi’s production of Messiaen’s Saint François d’Assise for the Holland Festival 2008, and the Amsterdam productions of Mozart’s Da Ponte operas, directed by Jossi Wieler and Sergio Morabito.

Ingo Metzmacher was born in Hanover. He studied piano, music theory and conducting in his home town and in Salzburg and Cologne. He found his first artistic home in Frankfurt, with the Ensemble Modern and the Frankfurt Opera under the artistic directorship of Michael Gielen. His international career began in 1988, during Gerard Mortier’s tenure as director of the La Monnaie in Brussels, when he stepped in to conduct a new production of Franz Schreker’s Der ferne Klang.