Laeiszhalle

The Laeiszhalle stands in Hamburg’s Neustadt district beside the Wallring, a curved boulevard of lime trees. Martin Haller designed the Baroque Revival building, which opened in 1908 as Germany’s largest and most modern concert hall. It was funded by the F. Laeisz shipping company, whose name it still bears. The hall survived the Second World War without damage and briefly housed a British Forces radio studio. After 1945 it returned to music, becoming a stage for stars from Maria Callas to Elton John. The hall has two separate performance spaces suited to chamber and early romantic works rather than vast twentieth-century scores. The Hamburger Symphoniker and Philharmoniker Hamburg make it their home. Richard Strauss, Sergei Prokofiev and Igor Stravinsky conducted their own music here. Vladimir Horowitz gave one of his first international recitals in 1926, and twelve-year-old Yehudi Menuhin played in 1930. Inside, the cream-coloured walls and ornate plasterwork frame an intimate atmosphere. The smaller hall is especially resonant for string quartets and Lieder recitals. The management now shares leadership with the nearby Elbphilharmonie under one concert company. Visitors can attend rehearsals or concerts and walk the Wallring afterwards under the lime trees.