We have not chosen “Be Embraced” from Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony to conclude this season of the Ruhrtriennale but his harrowing appeal for peace “Dona nobis pacem” from Missa Solemnis. Beethoven’s highly personal bequest represents a milestone in Western music as an artform. After he had already expanded the boundaries and dimensions of the symphony, the string quartet and the sonata, in this mass he wrote his most ambitious vocal composition to date. He spent longer working on the mass than any other work – it was a “work in progress” that would ultimately be the only piece of sacred music he would complete in the last years of his life.  With a dedication bordering on obsession, in Missa Solemnis Beethoven attempted to find a perfect setting for the words of the mass. As he also sought to include a sonic representation of his own humanistic views, the work broadened out to become a musical utopia of a world in peace and freedom.
Steven Sloane and the Bochumer Symphoniker will prepare a complete “Beethoven experience” around Beethoven’s final mass which will take place in the spaces of the Anneliese Brost Musikforum in Bochum. This is a unique opportunity to explore the Bochumer Symphoniker’s new home.