CHICAGO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA & JAAP VAN ZWEDEN

The Musikfestspiele, which regularly hosts the world’s leading orchestras, is delighted that the Chicago Symphony Orchestra – one of the most venerable and prestigious orchestras in the USA – will stop in Dresden once again during its 2025 tour of Europe. Under the baton of the Dutch star conductor Jaap van Zweden, the American musicians will fill Dresden’s Kulturpalast with Gustav Mahler’s visionary music. This composer had a nearly unique manner of continuously pushing the boundaries of orchestral sound, taking it to new and unheard-of dimensions. His Seventh Symphony, first performed in Prague in 1908, which straddles »the boundary between dream and reality«, according to van Zweden, is one of the most challenging works in the entire orchestral literature. Despite the fact that Mahler called his work »cheerful« and »humoristic«, its movements entitled »Night Music« also feature highly contrasting dark episodes, lending the music an existential character.

CHICAGO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
JAAP VAN ZWEDEN CONDUCTOR

Gustav Mahler

Symphony No. 7 in E-minor