Freundeskreis-Konzert

Tickets for non-members will be available approximately three weeks before the concert. Members will receive an invitation. Beethoven's 'Missa solemnis' was first performed (in part) at the Kärntnerthortheater in Vienna in 1824, on the same evening that his Symphony No. 9 had its premiere. This work is almost exclusively presented today in concert halls: Although it is a sacred Mass, it still breaks the liturgical framework. Beethoven indeed studied intensively with the Mass text and older settings, but he composed this work nevertheless not for a religious community, but for the Viennese audience. He wanted to evoke and sustain 'religious feelings' with all means of his art, as he formulated in a letter. That a critic afterwards praised his 'divine musical artistry' fits perfectly.