Beat Club Bliss: The Two of us
Beautiful sound, highly virtuosic, colorful and delicate, yet powerful and dynamic: the recorder has long shed its image as a childish squeaky toy. Exceptionally talented, Theresia Volbers is one of its youngest protagonists, while her older brother Max is a shooting star of the Baroque scene.
At the beginning of Bach's C minor Partita in the version for recorder and harpsichord, the siblings stage a relationship play titled "The Two of Us" in three chapters. Each chapter begins with movements from the Partita, followed by a contemporary piece full of surprises, and then some catchy Baroque or gallant music.
The first part "within me", introduced by Bach's solemn prelude, is intimate, with the performers somewhat on their own. In the chapter "for us," after Bach's expansive fugue and dignified sarabande, the world premiere of Winfried Michel's "NUR" follows. "What's so great about the piece," notes Theresia, "is how wonderfully it represents the three levels of relationships that our program 'The Two of Us' conveys in music: There are moments where each person is introspective, others where a dialogue develops from the interaction and one grows together, and some have explosive power. If I were to visualize the piece, I would draw two threads that occasionally intersect, distance themselves from one another or run parallel, each on their own. In the end, we swap instruments. Since we both play recorder and harpsichord, it fits quite well!" In Hotteterre's Passacaille, they both then pick up the recorder. In the third chapter, they become extremely virtuosic and infectiously "beside themselves," with Theresia sometimes playing two flutes at once.
Theresia Volbers is the winner of the GWK award 2026. She studied with Tabea Debus in Hannover and is currently at the Mozarteum Salzburg with Dorothee Oberlinger. Max Volbers, among other honors, received the GWK award in 2013 and was named Young Artist of the Year at the OPUS Klassik in 2023. He teaches at the Mozarteum Salzburg and performs throughout Europe and in the USA.
THE TWO OF US:
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750): Partita in C minor, BWV 997
Marina Toshich (*1964): Samai Hijaz
Francesco Rognoni (2nd half of 16th century – 1626): Vestiva i colli
Francesco Barsanti (1690–1775): The Lass of Peatie’s Mill
Winfried Michel (*1948): NUR world premiere
Jacques Hotteterre (1673–1763): Passacaille for two recorders
Moritz Eggert (*1965): Out of Breath
Arcangelo Corelli (1653–1713): La Follia
Hallo, ich bin Maya.
