Staatskapelle Berlin

On our final night in Berlin we visited Philharmonie, the concert hall for the Berlin Philharmonic. The Berlin Philharmonic was on tour, as usual, and we saw instead the Staatskapelle Berlin.  Disney  Hall in Los Angeles looks far odder on the outside, but inside this one is very confusing indeed.  In fact one of our group members got lost, and a search party had to be dispatched.  Here is the view on the inside.

It was a very wowie concert.  We started off with that rarest of pieces, the Rachmaninov Third Piano Concerto.  I feel fairly certain I haven't heard it before.  A piano concerto is supposed to be a  battle between equals, but in this work the piano wins hands down.  In the first movement the orchestra hardly has a chance to compete.  For the pianist it is notoriously, spectacularly difficult.  Our pianist was Daniil Trifonov, and he never stumbled once.  If you haven't heard of him, watch out.  It was marvelous.

The second half of the program was Manuel de Falla's Three Cornered Hat.  It was fun and very loud.  That might possibly be a problem with really good acoustics.