A firecracker performance by Vladimir Jurowski and the Rundfunk Sinfonieorchester Berlin giving urgency to music composed at a time that echoes our own. Published on Bachtrack.

Gidon Kremer, long-time champion of Sofia Gubaidulina, joined the Berliner Philharmoniker and Christian Thielemann for a performance of In tempus praesens. Published on Bachtrack.

The Deutsches Symphonie Orchester Berlin is roaming around its hometown this season with a series of chamber music concerts in unexpected places.  In a former ballroom in the up-and-coming Neukölln district, the orchestra’s chamber ensemble presented an eccentric programme of music by oddballs and outcasts. Published on Bachtrack.

Berlin’s Konzerthaus Orchestra began its new season with works by two composers set against the artistic orthodoxies of their day. Published on Bachtrack.

Isabelle Faust’s performance of Luigi Nono’s La lontananza nostalgica utopica futura was an extraordinary time capsule back to the work’s première in 1988. Published on Bachtrack.

Although a British composer by birth, Rebecca Saunders is most respected in Germany, where she has spent much of her working life. Her latest project was an immersive choreographed programme with the Junge Deutsche Philharmonie based around her violin concerto still. Published on Bachtrack.

Dennis Russell Davies is a long-standing champion of American minimalism. For his guest appearance with the Berlin Konzerthausorchester last weekend, he was joined by violinist Chad Hoopes for performances of Philip Glass and John Adams alongside Bruckner’s First. Published on Bachtrack.

Michael Jarrell is a Swiss composer with a considerable reputation in mainland Europe – he was appointed Chevalier to the French Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 2004. This week, he was the subject of a composer portrait given by the Ensemble United Berlin under their Artistic Advisor and long-time conductor Vladimir Jurowski. Published on Bachtrack.

The Berliner Philharmoniker’s Academy is the future of this city’s most famous orchestra. Established 40 years ago by Herbert von Karajan, a third of current Berliner Philharmoniker members are Academy graduates. Their final project this season was an “Akademie Modern” with Susanna Mälkki. Published on Bachtrack.

It has been 14 years since John Eliot Gardiner last conducted the Berlin Philharmonic. He marked his return visit with a remarkable performance of one of Stravinsky’s most forbidding works.

At the climax of James MacMillan’s St Luke Passion, after Christ has breathed his last on the cross, the composer summons up a cacophonous orchestral fury. But amidst thunderous, discordant brass blooms an ethereal chorale – a direct quotation of Bach’s chorale, O Haupt Voll Blut und Wunden. This is an audacious gesture handled with maturity and woven into a highly distinctive musical language.

BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artist Zhang Zuo made her Wigmore Hall debut last Monday with a programme pairing late Schubert to early Schumann. Two pieces close in history (written just over 10 years from each other) but miles apart in temperament. However, under Zuo’s fingers, all seemed youthful and attacked with significant energy – almost to the point of seeming nervy, even though she has become a distinguished performer in both China and Europe.

Bartók described Duke Bluebeard’s Castle as a “mystery of the soul”. In his masterpiece of symbolist music drama, he takes us, the audience, with Judith, the curious and naïve young bride, on a revelatory journey into the soul of the mythical Duke Bluebeard.

Seven Last Words from the Cross is James MacMillan’s eccentric yet highly dramatic presentation of the last seven sentences uttered by Jesus before his crucifixion. It is a challenging piece, handled well by the young singers and reduced forces of Clare College Choir and the Dmitri Ensemble, under the direction of Graham Ross, the conductor of both groups.