Yes, I was very sad. I didn’t want to miss his last concert. So we played together – Mahler 7 with Barenboim at Salzburg Festival late August this year. Dieter on the 1st, me on the 2nd flute. Then Dieter retired from the Vienna Philharmonic. An orchestra which he has shaped as famous Principal-Flutist and excellent CEO for so many years. During the last 15 years we worked together, I could not imagine to have a better, nicer and more helpful colleague than Dieter. He helped me so many times, I learned from him what it is meant to stay really “cool” if everyone is exaggerating around you. He played and still plays with stunning technique and with very clear musicality. The Widman-Flute concerto in Vienna this year was amazing and more than proof of his outstanding quality!
Of course – retirement from the orchestra is not retirement from music at all! Especially for him!
He works as professor at the University in Graz and his concert calendar seems to be filled with very nice international projects and tours! All the best for the next chapter in your life, Dieter!
Stay healthy and thank you so much for everything!

I’m really looking very much forward to the upcoming concert at Musikverein Vienna next week.

Sharon and I have some really nice plans and projects in the near future, including recording  a new CD with the Swedish Chamber Orchestra in May this year.

Together with fantastic pianist Lorenzo Cossi from Trieste (Italy) we will play a brilliant, virtuoso and colorful program for flute-aficionados in the Glass Hall of Musikverein.

NIE
wollte da einer
sich wegschreiben,

den Dingen den Abschied geben:
sie verdienen ihn
nicht.

Die Ort nimmt
einer doch
mit sich?

Wer er auch ist:
gefragt wird
der nicht.

Die Kluft, die
sich auftut in
Zwischenzeiten:

ihr Urheber
möchte ich
nicht sein.

Und selbst
wenn ich
es wäre,

weigerte
ich mich,
es einzugestehen;

verweigerte ich,
einzustehen für
eine Tat,

die mir unterlief
und unverhofft
zustieß.

Wegatmen
will ich sie,
als wäre sie Luft.

Fabjan Hafner

After a Vienna Phil concert today in Livorno, Italy (Zubin Mehta, Beethoven 6 and 7) and Lohengrin tomorrow at Vienna State Opera I’m leaving to Japan on Wednesday.

My concert schedule includes the Mozart Concertos D and G with the Yamagata and Kyoto Symphony Orchestras as well as the Ibert Concerto with the Kyushu Symphony Orchestra.
In-between are very nice Recital with marvellous pianist Ryoko SAWAKI (photo) including music by Roussel, Fauré , Casella, Taffanel, Poulenc and the Sonatas by Franz Schubert (Arpeggione), Richard Strauss and César Franck in Gifu, Nagoya, Tokyo (Nikkei-Hall and Tokyo Bunka Kaikan) and Kagoshima.
I’m very much looking forward to meet many friends, perform in marvellous concert halls and enjoy the best food in the world!

A colorful concert tour is done. We started in Paris and continued to Munich, Vienna, Budapest, New York City, Naples/Fl, Bogota and Sao Paolo. Many concerts and a lot of travelling for the orchestra and Maestro Valery Gergiev are behind us. Next to the concerts I enjoyed my masterclasses in Naples/Fl and Sao Paolo. I met nice students and some very good flutists.
The contrast between sunny 30 degrees in Sao Paolo/ Brazil, and below zero temperatures, rain, snow and wind in Vienna was quite something, but we hope that the winter will not last much longer this year. The easter bunny is around the corner!

After returning from a truly intense fortnight in Japan, I enjoyed a lovely holiday with my even lovelier family in St. Anton. Just barely enough to build up enough stamina to get through this crazy week – the orchestra has a small tour to Munich and Paris coming up, and I thought, well, frankly, that is too boring for me, I need a little more (just kidding of course)… So I scheduled a performance of Mozart’s Flute and Harp-Concerto in Villach, my hometown, with my wonderful colleague Anneleen Lenaerts on Wednesday.

But how to get to rehearsals and concerts in the middle of a tour to somewhere completely different? The solution I came up with is sort of fun in a way: I rented a really comfortable car and my fabulous niece Johanna Auer as a driver, and she will take us to Klagenfurt after the opera on Tuesday (Rusalka, that I’ve never really played before, just to keep things spicy), to Munich after the rehearsal on Wednesday, back to Villach after the concert in Munich on Wednesday, and back home to Vienna after the concert on Thursday, just in time to catch the plane to Paris on Friday morning.
All in a week’s work… Lots of wonderful music and lots of time on the road – looking forward to both in a way!

We are on a almost 3 weeks tour through Asia with Christoph Eschenbach and a lot of Mozart. And sometimes very precious and unforgettable moments happen on the way. Like Maestro Seiji OZAWA leading a rehearsal and conducting  Beethovens “Egmont” Ouverture at Suntory Hall, Tokyo.
Unforgettable.

This is my view from the stage of our Summer Nights Concert in Schönbrunn. Impressive!

This week, a few days before Easter and 1 1/2 weeks before my big day at the Vienna City Marathon, I visited Toyko for only two days. And so I can add Tokyo after Vienna, Athens, Hamburg, Munich and New York to the cities where I had my intense training runs for the upcoming marathon. Sakura are in full bloom in Tokyo and while circling the Imperial Palace grounds I felt that I was performing a very efficient form of hanami..

In the evening I joined my friend Julien Beaudiment for his wonderful concert “Strings for Flute”. I was part of one encore and I enjoyed it tremendously! By the way: Congratulation Julien for becoming the new flute professor at Lyon Conservatory!!

Back in Vienna I finished my last long distance run of more than 4 hours this morning. Elektra tonight will be done in less than half!

Some of you might be aware of the fact that the Musikverein houses an extensive collection of musical manuscripts, prints and so on, but that a sizable, impressive number of historic musical instruments are also part of the deal is almost a secret… Archive Director Dr. Otto Biba is the warden and guardian of these treasures. The musical instruments are housed in a state-of-the-art vault-like storage room deep down in the cellar, and one cupboard is filled with traverse flutes!
A couple of months ago, we had the the privilege of trying a few of them, and selected two flutes to be played at a concert next week. These are by Schöllnast, Preßburg makers at the beginning of the 19th centuries. During the last weeks, Julia has carefully tried to reacquaint them with being played, and they have reacted very well, almost seeming to enjoy the process.. The series of concerts with musical instruments is aptly called “Nun klingen sie wieder..”, roughly translated as “Now they sound again”. If you would like to hear flutes that have been silent for decades, if not centuries, join us on April 8th at Musikverein/Brahmssaal!