On Friday evening, the mayor of Ahrensburg, Eckart Boege, and Dr Jens Voß, first chairman of the Ahrensburg Youth Orchestra Association, opened the festival with speeches and the JSOA with the fourth movement of Johannes Brahms’ Symphony No. 1. The FYSO then rocked the stage of the Eduard-Söring Hall with Gustav Holst’s ‘The Planets’ and George Gershwin’s ‘An American in Paris’, among others.
In addition to the musical activities, there were of course excursions into the surrounding area. We visited the Miniature Wonderland with the guests in Hamburg, walked through the Speicherstadt warehouse district to the Elbphilharmonie concert hall and looked out over Hamburg harbour until a thunderstorm forced us to start our return journey. We also travelled to Travemünde, where we took a boat trip to Lübeck and then visited the old town.
After excursions with the host families on Saturday, the next highlight took place in the evening: the international chamber music evening, where we rehearsed a piece in mixed international groups within 30 minutes, which was then performed, was met with great cheers and an exuberant atmosphere. The perfect basis for the subsequent get-together: we rounded off the evening with delicious cocktails, barbecued food and ice cream – and of course there was also a public viewing of the final eight of the European Championships against Denmark; everyone was on the edge of their seats until the very last second and even the Americans quickly became fans of the German team.
On Sunday morning, the Bamberg Young Chamber Orchestra demonstrated its virtuoso skills across the history of music with Vivaldi’s ‘Four Seasons’, the waltz from Tchaikovsky’s String Serenade and a medley of ABBA classics.
The traditional promenade concert on Sunday evening, where all three orchestras performed one of their own pieces as well as Florence Price’s Juba Dance together, was the crowning glory of the festival.
A huge thank you to the host families, without whose support the festival would not have been possible! We would also like to thank the town of Ahrensburg as well as all the sponsors and the members of the VJOA board, who were also instrumental in making the festival possible.
Our sponsors
