Sergei Rachmaninoff
Concerto for Piano and Orchestra No. 1 in F sharp minor op. 1
Anton Bruckner
Symphony No. 2 in C minor WAB 102
Valentin Uryupin
Conductor
Valentin Uryupin - Conductor
“Tchaikovsky has never been more modern, and conductor Valentin Uryupin lives this out consistently and rather stunningly.” – Süddeutsche Zeitung
Valentin Uryupin feels equally at home conducting both symphonic and operatic repertoire. In recent years, he has established close artistic partnerships with various orchestras and opera houses in both areas. This season, in addition to several debuts, he has several return invitations, including with the ORF Radio Symphony Orchestra Vienna, the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin (where he made his debut in a CDD production for Sony Classical), and the Teatro Regio Torino, where he will lead a new production of Tchaikovsky’s The Queen of Spades. He will also make his first regular season appearance with the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra following a successful substitute engagement in spring 2024.
Notable debuts this season include performances with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, where he will conduct concerts with cellist Julia Hagen in Antwerp and Ghent, at the Berlin State Opera (in Carmen), and at the Bavarian State Opera (conducting Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas and Schönberg’s Erwartung). He has developed a close collaboration with the Frankfurt Opera, where he will return to conduct a new production of Tchaikovsky’s The Enchantress this season, having previously achieved great success with Oedipus Rex and Jolanthe.
As a guest conductor, he has also worked with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra, New Japan Philharmonic, Tapiola Sinfonietta, SWR Symphony Orchestra, Orchestra della Toscana, Orchestra Filarmonica del Teatro Comunale di Bologna, German Radio Philharmonic Saarbrücken Kaiserslautern, Gulbenkian Orchestra, Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra, Janáček Philharmonic Ostrava, Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra, George Enescu Philharmonic Orchestra, Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne, and the Danish National Symphony Orchestra. In the realm of opera, he has led highly praised productions at the Stuttgart State Opera, New National Theatre Tokyo, Hanover State Opera, Nuremberg Theatre, and the Bregenz Festival (including Eugene Onegin in 2021 and Siberia in 2022). He has also been a frequent guest at the Tiroler Festspiele Erl. Uryupin has collaborated with soloists such as Patricia Kopatchinskaja, Lars Vogt, Thomas Hampson, Bryn Terfel, Barbara Hannigan, Pepe Romero, Asmik Grigoryan, Vadim Gluzman, Vadim Repin, Yuri Bashmet, Denis Matsuev, Nikolai Lugansky, Sergei Khachatryan, and Marc-André Hamelin. His repertoire spans all periods, from Joseph Haydn and Jan Dimas Zelenka to Thomas Adès, Jörg Widmann, and Kaija Saariaho.
In autumn 2021, Valentin Uryupin became Chief Conductor and Artistic Director of the Novaya Opera in Moscow, where he presented major productions of Korngold’s Die tote Stadt and Massenet’s Cendrillon before stepping down. As Artistic Director of the Rostov Symphony Orchestra from 2015 to 2021, he developed the orchestra into one of Russia’s most prestigious ensembles. Uryupin has also made regular guest appearances with leading Russian orchestras, including the State Academic Symphony Orchestra “Evgeny Svetlanov,” the St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra, the Mariinsky Orchestra, the Ural Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Russian National Youth Symphony Orchestra, with whom he most recently performed at the Lucerne Festival in 2021. He also worked closely with the MusicAeterna Orchestra at the Perm Opera for several years.
Born in Losova, Ukraine, in 1985, Valentin Uryupin first gained recognition as a clarinetist, winning over 20 international competitions and performing worldwide before finding success as a conductor. The winner of the 8th Sir Georg Solti International Conducting Competition (2017), he completed his studies in both clarinet and conducting at the Moscow State Conservatory. His mentors include Gennadi Rozhdestvensky and clarinetist Evgeny Petrov. He also assisted Valery Gergiev, Teodor Currentzis, and Vladimir Jurowski, and received important guidance from Kurt Masur in his final master class. While his soloist career has now taken a back seat to his conducting engagements, he occasionally performs as both a conductor and clarinetist in play-conduct concerts and remains a passionate chamber musician.
Anna Vinnitskaya
Piano
Anna Vinnitskaya - Piano
The 1st prize at the Concours Reine Elisabeth in Brussels in 2007 marked Anna Vinnitskaya’s international breakthrough. Her performances with top orchestras such as the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, the Gewandhaus Orchestra Leipzig, the Staatskapelle Dresden, the Munich Philharmonic Orchestra, the NHK Symphony Orchestra Tokyo, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France and the Boston Symphony Orchestra have been met with great enthusiasm worldwide. The breathtaking technical precision and tonal nuances of her piano playing allow her maximum creative power in her interpretations. Anna Vinnitskaya’s piano playing is characterised by unconditionality, energy and poetic depth.
Anna Vinnitskaya will perform Rachmaninov’s piano concertos in the 2025/2026 season with the Orchestre de Paris under Klaus Mäkelä, the London Philharmonic Orchestra with Vladimir Jurowski and the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin under Eva Ollikainen, among others. With the Bern Symphony Orchestra and chief conductor Krzysztof Urbański, she will even perform all of Rachmaninov’s piano concertos on two consecutive evenings. Ravel’s Concerto for the Left Hand is on the programme for the celebratory concert at the Vienna Musikverein to mark the 125th anniversary of the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, which Anna Vinnitskaya will perform together with chief conductor Petr Popelka, followed by a tour to the Hamburg Elbphilharmonie, Müpa Budapest, the Essen Philharmonie and the Konzerthaus Freiburg. Anna Vinnitskaya will perform recitals this season in Bordeaux, Tokyo, Paris, Luxembourg, Madrid and Hamburg, among others. Together with Evgeni Koroliov and Ljupka Hadzi- Georgieva, she will perform Bach’s works for one to three pianos and orchestra with the Menuhin Academy Soloists in Vienna and Basel and with the Cologne Chamber Orchestra at the Cologne Philharmonie. Last season, Anna Vinnitskaya was the portrait artist of the Philharmonie Essen. In addition to a series of chamber concerts and recitals, she performed there with the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich under the direction of Paavo Järvi, the Mahler Chamber Orchestra under Elim Chan, as well as with Herbert Grönemeyer and the Bochum Symphony Orchestra.
Anna Vinnitskaya’s CD recordings for Alpha/Outhere have been honoured with numerous awards such as the Diapason d’Or and the Gramophone Editor’s Choice, including a celebrated Chopin album, a Rachmaninov album with the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra and Krzysztof Urbański and the album ‘Piano Dances’ released in 2024. She combines her own version of Ravel’s highly virtuosic piece ‘La Valse’ and his ‘Valses nobles et sentimentales’ with the ‘Puppet Dances’ by Shostakovich and the ‘Circus Dances’ by Jörg Widmann. Her recording of Bach’s piano concertos together with Evgeni Koroliov, Ljupka Hadzi Georgieva and the Kammerakademie Potsdam is particularly close to her heart.
Anna Vinnitskaya was born in Novorossiysk, Russia. She studied with Sergei Ossipienko in Rostov and then with Evgeni Koroliov at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater in Hamburg, where she has been a professor since 2009. Anna Vinnitskaya is increasingly a juror at renowned piano competitions, such as the Concours Reine Elisabeth in May 2025 and the ARD International Music Competition in September 2025.
Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin
Change of conductor
Unfortunately, Eva Ollikainen has had to step down from conducting the concert for health reasons. We are delighted that Valentin Uryupin – known to the RSB from a CD recording in 2023 and from the narrative concert in 2024 (‘The Magic Mountain’ by Thomas Mann) and celebrated by the audience at the time – has agreed to join the project at short notice. The programme remains unchanged.
Melodic Majesty
Even though they came before their composers’ more popular works, the two works presented here deserve special attention. Piano Concerto No. 1, which Sergei Rachmaninoff began writing at the age of seventeen and finally completed in 1917 at the age of 44, shows Rachmaninoff’s full melodic range, despite its affinity to Edvard Grieg’s piano concerto and the type of concertos written by Chopin and Liszt.
Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto in F-sharp minor shares its pulsating energy with Anton Bruckner’s Symphony No. 2. It, too, stands at the beginning of its composer’s symphonic oeuvre, although he was already 47 years old at the time. Bruckner layers block upon block, wave upon wave. His architectural principle knows no „victor“ or „vanquished“ motif. Tension and escalation are achieved through rhythmic condensation of individual sounds, block-like instrumentation, and the gradual metamorphosis of intervals. “In this way, Bruckner succeeded in finding an authentic solution to the symphonic problem, on a par with those of Brahms and Mahler.” (Mathias Hansen)
Concert with
