A project that combines music and nature conservation in a unique way: British composer and pianist Graham Fitkin has been cycling from Romania to the UK since mid-May.
His 4,000 kilometre route runs from the last remaining European primeval forests to the west, where the old-growth forests are dwindling. He stops off at 20 locations between Bucharest and London and gives a concert, including at the Tonhalle Düsseldorf. Each partner institution had previously sent Fitkin sound files of a specific tree, which he used for his new composition "Treeline". The Tonhalle contributed ambient sounds and audio recordings from inside the blood maple tree that Adam Fischer planted in the Hofgarten for a climate concert in December 2022. Music mediator Katrin Sedlbauer also developed a musical performance with senior citizens from Düsseldorf and a wind quintet from the Düsseldorf Symphony Orchestra.
Over a rehearsal phase of three months, Katrin Sedlbauer and the performance group will create a musical walk in the ZentrumPlus Derendorf-Nord, inviting the audience to experience the "Royal Red" blood maple planted by Adam Fischer in an artistic way before the concert. The wind quintet will not only musically accompany the performance with excerpts from Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy's "A Midsummer Night's Dream", but will also be an integral part of the subsequent "Treeline" concert with Graham Fitkin in the rotunda of the Tonhalle, making the concert in Düsseldorf a world premiere.
Graham Fitkin, piano and composition; musicians of the Düsseldorf Symphony Orchestra; performance group ZentrumPlus, performance (source: Tonhalle Düsseldorf)
