What’s on this 2024-25 season

Benjamin Appl reminisces: At a public master class in Schwarzenberg, Austria, I was able to get to know my greatest idol and work with him for the first time. To this day, I consider this encounter and the resulting years of collaboration to be one of the greatest gifts of my professional life. For me he was more than “just” a teacher: he helped me considerably with technical and interpretive ideas, but also advised me in the art of performing on stage and crafting programs. He was a real mentor to me in so many ways. I feel fortunate that I was able to see him just before his death, in the spring of 2012 at his home on Lake Starnberg and that I can cherish that final memory.

In the last few months I was able to go through Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau's private documents and, in his diary entries, letters and notes, gain an insight into the private person that Fischer-Dieskau was. This evening’s recital is dedicated to him, and is intended to explore the life of the great baritone and unveil the many facets of his personality. Alongside music, I share anecdotes, travel reports, excerpts from letters along with my personal insights and memories.