NEWS

The Herbert von Karajan Music Prize 2015/2016 is to be awarded to the conductor Thomas Hengelbrock. The decision was announced by the chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Festspielhaus Baden-Baden Cultural Foundation, Dr. Clemens B旦rsig. The award ceremony will take place on the occasion of a performance of the Elijah oratorio by Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, on Saturday, 30 January 2016. The prize money of 50,000 euros will be devoted to benefiting young musicians.
The Board of Trustees of the Festspielhaus Baden-Baden Cultural Foundation explained its decision to award the prize to Thomas Hengelbrock as being due to his extraordinary commitment to the education of young musicians. "There is virtually no other conductor who asks the question 'What is my task as a musician today?' as publicly and as clearly as does Thomas Hengelbrock. In this way, he is expanding the concept of music performance for future generations by incorporating the decisive element of music performance for professional musicians. The enthusiasm and joy of discovery with which Thomas Hengelbrock goes about this are as infectious as they are stimulating. He characterises the image of a modern (in the best sense of the word) conductor, who has a command of the musical repertoire from more than four centuries and who never stops questioning both the music and the way it is played. In this context, his collaboration with the Balthasar-Neumann Choir and Ensemble is uniquely exemplary. Thomas Hengelbrock's work with the NDR Symphony Orchestra is a seamless extension of this."
Benchmark-setting operatic and oratorio performances have been witnessed again and again in Baden-Baden throughout the last fifteen years under the leadership of Thomas Hengelbrock. In the context of the awarding of this high accolade to Thomas Hengelbrock, Andreas M旦lich-Zebhauser, artistic director of the Festspielhaus, points to performances in recent years of the Verdi opera 'Rigoletto' on period instruments as well as Bach oratorios, played with great precision and emotion.

http://www.festspielhaus.de/en/thomas-hengelbrock-erhaelt-den-herbert-von-karajan-musikpreis-2015-2016/