Starkes Blech 2019

Two years ago I marked the dates June 7-8, 2019, on my virtual calendar. Starkes Blech is one of my favorite concert events in Stuttgart. It is overwhelming to hear 300 brass players being led through music from Wagner to The Scorpions - with a world premiere performance of a new work every time to boot! If that weren't enough, the courtyard of the Old Castle in Stuttgart serves as the perfect setting.

Christof Schmidt begins the public rehearsal on the evening before the final concert. 

What to focus on? There is always so much going on during the concerts that you need to pay attention to everything.

Finally it's showtime. Months of rehearsals with individual ensembles and tutti meetings are about to pay off for the hundreds of listeners.

The program for 2019 included music from over 500 years, including Luther, Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, Debussy and Wagner (both in moving arrangements by bass trombonist Tobias Rägle).

For the final encore Christof Schmidt conducted the players and the audience in a tutti version of "Der Mond ist aufgegangen". Each verse was played in a different arrangement. The first was by the German father of the brass choir movement, Johannes Kuhlo. The second was arranged by Traugott Fünfgeld, a contemporary composer of sacred music who has written several pieces played in Stuttgart over the past decade. Music for the final stanza was arranged by the initiator of Starkes Blech, Hans Holzwarth.