"On Wednesday (23 Nov 22) my tour with the Staatskapelle Dresden ended with an eventful concert at the Elbphilharmonie Hamburg. When I entered the stage together with Tugan Sokhiev, I saw two young people who had physically glued themselves to the conductor's podium.
A situation quickly developed that probably no artist likes to experience: an immediately upset, even angry audience, a delay while we artists were faced with the task of presenting a concert for which we had prepared extensively, which we were looking forward to and with which - in this case - we wanted to end a wonderful tour.
I don't wish to talk about the behavior of the two young people, the audience or the organizer. Instead, I would like to underline two things that are important to me:
Firstly, the global community is manifestly failing to collectively address humanity's greatest crisis, the climate catastrophe. This is what needs to be talked about, not young people superglued to the bar on the conductor's podium. Secondly, a concert hall can certainly be a place for political exchange. In the cultural sector, the consequences of the Russian war of aggression on Ukraine in recent months have shown how political culture sometimes has to be."
A current ZDF report on the event can be found here.