The Dresden Staatskapelle conductor has cancelled his forthcoming concerts due to a shoulder injury.
His concert next week will be taken over by Tugan Sokhiev and David Afkham, both in Dresden and on tour in Luxembourg.
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Maybe he’s got job interviews in Berlin and Chicago?
Never – wherever he goes it’s trouble – he should only conduct his German repertoire where he is superb, actually only Wagner Bruckner and Strauss – the rest is mediocre and his personality is the incarnation of a German in its most negative way
He speaks well of you, though.
CT is one of the greatest Debussy conductors, for instance .. Henze with him – amazing. Tosca in Salzburg has been absolutely great.
No. he got injured in Chicago trying to make the CSO emit a more decent sound.
Perhaps he got hurt by Riccardo Muti who wants to stay on in Chicago for ever.
Really? He barely moves his arms as it is when he conducts, he conducts by leaning with his torso, the only conductor less animate than him was Reiner.
I think he just wanted his badly needed vacation that was interrupted by his 2 cycles of the Ring in Berlin and a series in Chicago and in preparation for the upcoming tour in Asia.
Who can blame him? The man needs his rest, Dresden is not his priority since they served him divorce papers, he and Berlin are now seriously wooing each other and the Asia tour marks the next phase in their engagement.
Best up maestro!
*Rest* up…
Not to mention he has yet another Ring cycle right around the corner in January with Dresden. A man’s gotta keep his powder dry.
I remember meeting him in Hamburg for Tristan. He had 3 Shirts for every act 1. Because he was so in sweat. It’s not the big movements, it’s the intensity. So I guess with an arm injury he really is not able to conduct. But that’s only a theory.
He probably has arthritis in his shoulder; a very common complaint in the over-60 brigade.
Get well soon, Maestro Thielemann.
From my front-row perch for Berlin’s just-completed Cycle III, right atop the Staatsoper’s orchestra pit (which I’m told was sunk to its maximum depth of 2.9 meters for all performances), Thielemann was an invisible presence save the occasional baton tip, spotted maybe five times across the four works. So it was quite a surprise, nearing the Immolation Scene’s climactic finish, to see a fleeting fist fly above the wall (with thrilling orchestral results, I should add). Maybe that’s when Maestro threw out his shoulder.
As I was going to Dresden specifically to hear the Sunday program – now entirely changed – it still amazes me that classical institutions can get away with changing everything one bought without notice.
Besides, it’s not as if the Mendelssohn violin concerto and 3rd symphony are out of anyone’s repertoire. Is Sokhiev really incapable of conducting those works at 5 days’ notice?
More like a two days’ notice until rehearsals begin I suppose.
Interesting that Thielemann is still listed for the same program on tour beginning Thursday next week. (Luxemburg, Munich, Hamburg)
Probably there is some bad road on the freeway to Dresden, that hurts his shoulder in his uncomfortable Porsche.
I checked – only Munich has not updated their listing yet, the Elbphilharmonie and the Luxembourg Philharmonie have made the change.
What I surmise happened: Thielemann was going to conduct two programmes in Luxembourg and Hamburg (Mendelssohn in Prog. 1, Bruckner in Prog. 2). The Staatskapelle decided to split conductors, with Afkham doing program 1 and Sokhiev doing program 2 (Beethoven concerto and Brahms symphony 1). And therefore they gave Sokhiev an extra Dresden date (Nov. 13) to make his trip for rehearsals worth it, no matter what the audience paid to hear, while Afkham plays the Mendelssohn that was actually advertised on the two other concerts. So now Nov. 13 is still advertised as a concert for Mendelssohn’s 175th death anniversary, but without a single note of Mendelssohn.
(As a side note, the Semperoper told us to print out our print-at-home tickets, write CANCELLED on them, scan them, and email them back to request a refund. You couldn’t make this up)
Petrenko e.g. cancels much more often. Thielemann has had some back issues years ago.
It’s easy to acquire rotary cuff issues. I know!
Yep, that’s true. I had what my doctor called “frozen shoulder” (I believe the medical term is adhesive capsulitis) a few years back. It was quite painful: I couldn’t even reach for my back pocket without tremendous pain.
It appeared out of nowhere – there was no physical injury involved – and it took some months of therapy to get rid of it.
The thing is, I was told that frozen shoulder ordinarily occurs on the non-dominant side. Very odd.
Anyway, whatever it may be that ails him, I hope Thielemann gets well soon, and that his “injury” (the word NL used) is not serious.
Similar experience to yourself. A cortisone injection (I ended up having two) perked me up no end (and not just in the shoulder) and resolved the issue. Once you have had it on your weaker side you are significantly more likely to have it on the stronger side within ten years. In my case an actual event caused the issue – an over extension hitting a flyer on the golf course followed just a few days later having to stretch too far back when checking for ongoing traffic at a junction. It was agony and I had to stop the car a few hundred yards further forward to allow the pain to dissipate.
Something to do with the date of birth, perhaps?
Same with their two tour concerts in Hamburg (David Afkham on Nov. 22, Tugan Sokhiev on Nov. 23)…
I hope he will conduct the Beethoven 9th in Dresden in late December. I have a ticket for that.
Didn’t Furtwängler have the stiffest shoulders ever?