Bernstein’s West Side Story in a special arrangement!

Leonard Bernstein’s “West Side Story” is undoubtedly one of the best-known and most successful works in musical history. Just how timeless both the plot and the musical material are was only proven again in 2021 with Steven Spielberg’s award-winning remake. However, one of the most impressive adaptations of Bernstein’s musical takes place away from the big stages and screens – the Cologne guitarist Lucian Plessner arranged some passages of this groundbreaking work into a suite for guitar. Plessner had sent Bernstein’s publisher his solo arrangement of the aria “Maria” in 1989, whereupon Bernstein enthusiastically commissioned him to write a whole cycle of numbers from “West Side Story”. Bernstein even wanted to meet Plessner in person, but unfortunately this never happened, as he died on October 14, 1990, shortly before his planned trip to Cologne. 

Plessner then traveled to New York and met with Bernstein’s publisher to look at the original scores he had left behind, some of which he was even able to take back to Germany. In 2010, he published his complete “West Side Story” suite for the first time with an arrangement for chamber orchestra by Andreas Kowalewitz, which was successfully premiered in Indianapolis in Bernstein’s anniversary year 2018 – almost 30 years after the composition was written. We are now delighted that the suite will celebrate its German premiere on August 18, when it will be performed three times at the Wallraf-Richartz-Museum. Wulfin Lieske will play the solo guitar part together with the Kölner Akademie under the direction of Michael Alexander Willens.