Academic Orchestra Berlin

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The Academic Orchestra Berlin (AOB) is a symphonic amateur orchestra in Berlin .

The “academic” in the orchestra's title comes from the time it was founded, when it was the orchestra of what was then the “Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität zu Berlin” (now the Humboldt University ). However, this does not mean that only musicians with academic training are accepted. There are many professional teachers, doctors, scientists, engineers or lawyers, but also nurses, students of all stripes, private music teachers and others play in the AOB. Today musicians from many different countries play in the AOB. The youngest member is under 18, the oldest over 75 years old.

The concert programs of the AOB should be equally attractive for players and listeners, the level of difficulty should not be too demanding, but should always lead to the performance limit. The program design has been an essential factor for the continuous development of the orchestra from the very beginning.

history

The orchestra was founded in the winter semester of 1907/08 at Berlin University by students, including the later chairman (until 1965) and long-time organizer and sponsor Georg Mantze (1888–1983).

The well-known composer and conductor Heinz Tiessen led the orchestra since 1920, Carl Flesch played Mozart's violin concerto in A major under his direction in 1921.

In 1922 there was a concert tour to Scandinavia, the concertmaster of the AOB was then the later conductor and long-time head of the NDR orchestra, Hans Schmidt-Isserstedt (1900–1973).

From 1922 to 1924 the AOB was headed by Ernst Praetorius (1880–1946) and led a. a. the violin concertos by Spohr and Brahms with the violinist Georg Kulenkampff . In 1927 Walther Gmeindl (1890–1956) took over the direction of the orchestra and was able to attract the pianists Arthur Schnabel, Walter Gieseking and Wilhelm Kempff , as well as the violinist Gustav Havemann and the cellist Emanuel Feuermann as soloists and to promote the orchestra extraordinarily.

After the war Fritz Stein (1879–1961), Volker Wangenheim (1928–2014) and Carl Gorvin (* 1912) took over the artistic direction as conductors. Joachim Schmedes was a violinist in the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra and then baritone at the Stralsund City Theater before he began studying medicine. He worked as concertmaster for more than 30 years in the AOB and was instrumental in the development of the orchestra until 1983.

After brief interludes with the conductors Hermann Hildebrandt (1910–1982), Hans Chemin-Petit (1902–1981) and Claus Rößner (1936–2016), Hans Hilsdorf (1930–1999) took over the artistic direction in the autumn of 1962 . He directed the orchestra for 37 years and shaped it like no other. In more than 80 concerts, mostly new programs were developed and thus an always interesting and varied music-making at a high level was achieved. Several compositions and orchestrations were written by Prof. Hilsdorf for “his” orchestra, most recently the “Orchestervariationen über ein deutsches Volkslied” (Orchestral Variations on a German Folk Song), the premiere of which was conducted by his successor Andreas Schüller in November 1999 when Hilsdorf died . After Schüller's move to the Volksoper in Vienna, Peter Aderhold took over as conductor of the orchestra in 2003 .

Since 1998 the orchestra has had “Philharmonic Concert Masters” again. Heinz Ortleb took on this task until November 21, 2010. He was made an honorary member by the orchestra for his successful work. He was succeeded in 2011 by Helmut Mebert, who celebrated his 40th anniversary with the Berliner Philharmoniker in 2009.

The AOB celebrated its 100th anniversary on March 8, 2008 with a gala concert in the Berlin Philharmonic. After the opening of the concert with the overture to Handel's Fireworks Music handed over 2000 listeners Culture Secretary André Schmitz on this occasion the plaque Pro Musica the Federal President.

Repertoire (2016)

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