Fine Musica Sacra concert with baroque violinist Nina Pohn

Leopold Mozart already praised the viola d’amore in his violin tutor as “a special kind of violin that sounds really lovely, especially when it’s quiet in the evening”. The Upper Austrian violinist Nina Pohn took this as an opportunity to invite people to a solo recital as part of Musica Sacra in the Martinskirche in the evening. The special thing about the viola d’amore is its hybrid nature between the violas and the violins. From the former it has its body and the five to seven strings, from the violins the fretless fingerboard. But their aliquot strings, which run under the fingerboard and are only made to vibrate by resonance, are very special.

Silvery sound

This creates the silvery sound and the fine echo-like reverberation that you have to subtly plan for when composing. Nina Pohn deals with historical string instruments in a variety of ways, including the viola d’amore. In doing so, she delighted a large audience. She played the second part of the concert with her baroque violin and then presented Johann Sebastian Bach’s great Partita in D minor, which deals with the peculiarities of baroque standard dances on a completely different level. Pohn got the characters of the dances right to the point and made one forget the technical difficulties of polyphonic playing on four strings with a bow and four fingers.

• Conclusion: A fine evening, which for many listeners meant the first encounter with an exotic string instrument.