A week on tour flies by - we arrived at the last concert venue by bus (right on time!). You can't miss the Rosengarten building with its numours hall, because right opposite is Mannheim's landmark, the water tower, in the middle of an neo-baroque cum art nouveau ensemble with a park. One look out of the bus window in the bright sunshine and the direction for the lunch break is already set on the inner compass! Unfortunately, there's no time for a real city tour in Mannheim.

We haven't found a backstage area on this tour as labyrinthine as the one in Mannheim. At the front, everything at the front is very spacious, though. This is due to the fact that the Rosengarten is now a congress centre that has been extended several times and also houses various concert halls. Of course, we are extremely delighted that the large Mozart Hall is sold out for our concert! 

And so everything takes its course once again: instrument and tailcoat boxes are searched for (and found) in the labyrinth of corridors, the orchestra streams in for rehearsals. Before the last one on every journey, our orchestra board members always take the opportunity to thank the conductor - in this case Joana Mallwitz, of course - our stage managers Dirk Beyer, Gregor Beyer and Raphael Volkmer, our orchestra director Ulf Werner and Sophia Berendt, our orchestra manager, warmly and with small gifts on behalf of all our colleagues. 

The hall is filling up, behind the stage someone might still be looking for their cummerbund or a replacement for a torn bow tie, and the stage managers do a last round of the rooms: ‘Everyone who is playing Brahms - 3 minutes to go.’ Another sip of water, a glance at the bow or the double reed and off they go, out onto the stage for the last time.

Augustin Hadelich, our marvellous soloist, enthralled the audience in Mannheim once again with the Brahms Violin Concerto. And us aus well! We will miss him at the Konzerthaus, as his season as ‘Artist in Residence’ at the Gendarmenmarkt comes to an end with this tour. But we (and you) know from experience that our ‘AiR’ will be back. We are already looking forward to it, dear Augustin!