Musical Partnership Bremen-Odessa

On April 16, 2016, a concert was held in the Grand Hall of the Odessa Regional Philharmonic as part of the “Musical Partnership Bremen–Odessa” project.

One of the most ambitious German-Ukrainian cultural initiatives of the past decade, the project was held under the patronage of Germany’s Foreign Minister Mr. Steinmeier and Chancellor Mrs. Merkel. The project was initiated by Bundestag member Ms. Marieluise Beck and the ODESSA CLASSICS festival.

Participants included:

From Germany: the large Bremen City Choir (70 performers), led and conducted by Jan Hübner

From Ukraine: the Chamber Orchestra of the Odessa Philharmonic, pianist Alexey Botvinov, and vocalists Natalia Pavlenko, Anatoliy Duda, and Vasyl Dobrovolsky

The program featured masterpieces of German vocal-orchestral music rarely performed in Ukraine, including “Spring” and “Summer” from Joseph Haydn’s oratorio The Seasons, and Beethoven’s monumental Choral Fantasy for orchestra, choir, six soloists, and solo piano—a precursor to his famed Ode to Joy.

The second concert of the international project took place on April 30, 2016, in the renowned Bremen concert hall “Die Glocke” (“The Bell”), with the same lineup of performers. The performance was recorded for German radio.

The third and fourth concerts were held to continued audience acclaim on October 15, 2017, at the Odessa Regional Philharmonic and on October 29, 2017, at Bremen’s Sendesaal.

The fifth and sixth concerts of this now-established international tradition took place on October 11, 2018, in Odessa and on November 10, 2018, in Bremen.