On January 18, 2024, the Piano Concerto “Genesis” by Bernd Franke was premiered at the Gewandhaus in Leipzig together with the Gewandhaus Orchestra under the baton of Alan Gilbert.
The unusual form of the work was created in dialog with the soloist of the world premiere. Michael Wollny wanted musical opportunities to listen and react, improvisational freedom. In the orchestral writing, too, flexible, aleatoric situations with possibilities for freer playing open up alongside fully composed passages. Franke creates dense soundscapes that sound complex but are simply notated and in which the musicians act almost independently of each other.
The concerto was commissioned by the “Gerda Donges & Friedrich Steffen Pohle Foundation for Music in Leipzig” and the Gewandhaus Orchestra.
