Corinna Harfouch & Hideyo Harada
The concert series MEISTERWERKE presents the cultural life in its full diversity at the Berlin Cathedral – from great classics to literary-musical evenings to club culture. Amid sacred architecture and unique acoustics, unforgettable evenings are created – impressive, moving, and inspiring.
Corinna Harfouch & Hideyo Harada
“Our Whole Love, Our Whole Misery - A Program on Marie d'Agoult and Franz Liszt”
Saturday, April 17, 2027
Doors: 19:30, Start: 20:00
At the beginning of the year 1833, when the twenty-one-year-old Franz Liszt was playing at a soirée, there was among the guests one of the most elegant figures of Parisian society: Marie d’Agoult. The daughter of Count Maurice de Flavigny and granddaughter of banker Moritz Bethmann, she was born in 1805 in Frankfurt am Main. In 1827, she entered into a marriage of social status with the fifteen years older Count Charles d’Agoult, with whom she had two children. The marriage was not happy, but they had arranged themselves, and the Countess had complete freedom to pursue her intellectual interests. She opened her own salon where literary readings took place. Marie d’Agoult’s enchanting beauty, her taste, and her intelligence found many admirers. For Liszt, the relationship with the six years older Countess would become the first fulfilled love of his life. In Parisian salons, Marie’s love affair with Liszt was regarded as a scandal. Under societal pressure, the two fled to Switzerland. However, these years were also shadowed by frequent phases of separation. Liszt increasingly embarked on extensive concert tours, and thus an extensive correspondence developed between the two lovers, documenting both their intimate relationship and their waning happiness.
Under the motto Our Whole Love, Our Whole Misery, Corinna Harfouch and Hideyo Harada create a musical-literary program that dedicates itself to the couple Liszt – d’Agoult. Readings from Marie’s memoirs, the correspondence between her and Liszt, as well as documents from contemporaries will be interwoven with excerpts from the Années de Pélerinage and other piano works of the composer. Thus, word and tone connect to profound insights into one of the great love stories of the 19th century.
Corinna Harfouch is one of the best-known German character actresses in film, television, and theater. Sustainably and convincingly, she embodies the extremes of human existence. Her portrayal often becomes a tightrope walk between the abysses of life. The actress, born in Suhl, completed her studies at the Ernst Busch Academy of Dramatic Art in Berlin and has been seen on all major theater stages in Germany and in numerous guest performances in Austria and Switzerland since her training. Since her debut in front of the film camera in 1995, she has participated in more than 100 film and cinema productions. Current films include The Girl with the Golden Hands (2022) by Katharina Marie Schubert and Everything in Order (2022) by Natja Brunckhorst. Corinna Harfouch has received several awards for her work in theater. Among other accolades, she received the Gertrud-Eysoldt-Ring for outstanding acting in 1997 and was named Actress of the Year by the magazine Theater heute for her role as General Harras in Des Teufels General (directed by Frank Castorf) in the same year. She has also been honored with many awards for her film work, including the Bavarian Film Award, Adolf Grimme Award, German Television Award, German Film Award, German Actors Award, Günter Rohrbach Award, and Hessian Film Award.
“Whether it’s fiery emotion or dream-lost poetry, whether gentle or wild: Hideyo Harada is swept away by the music, exploring all emotional expressions from the delicate chord to the frenzy,” says the Süddeutsche Zeitung about the Japanese pianist. With her broad repertoire, she is now a welcome guest at international festivals and performs with significant orchestras.
Harada's versatility is also reflected in her extensive discography, which includes works by Samuel Feinberg and Michio Mamiya, as well as compositions by Schubert, Chopin, Schumann, Grieg, and Scriabin. As part of chamber music evenings, Hideyo Harada collaborates with the Borodin Quartet, violinists Latica Honda-Rosenberg and Mikhail Simonyan, cellist Jens Peter Maintz, and baritone Roman Trekel. In addition to recordings with international radio and television stations, several award-winning recordings of the pianist are available.
Doors: 19:30
Hallo, ich bin Maya.
