The award-winning symphony orchestra presented three pieces at the Berlin Orchestertreff 2019: first, a composition commissioned for the competition “Raptus – Die Freiheit des Beethoven” by Enjott Schneider. The musicians then played the second movement from Antonín Dvořák’s 7th Symphony and the fourth movement from Dimitri Schostakowitsch’s 5th Symphony.

The State Music Council in Berlin organizes the Berlin Orchestertreff every four years to promote instrumental music making and to select the candidates for the German Orchestra Competition. This year’s competition was the largest ever held in Berlin with around 50 registered ensembles and about 1400 participants.

The Symphony Orchestra of the Collegium Musicum Berlin consists of about 80 members, equally composed of students from Freie Universität Berlin and Technische Universität Berlin as well as external and former students, some of whom have been performing there for about 20 years. The repertoire includes a wide musical spectrum, especially from the romantic and the modern periods. Queen Elizabeth II., German Chancellor Angela Merkel, and former German President Joachim Gauck have all attended concerts by the Collegium Musicum. In addition to the symphony orchestra, the Collegium Musicum has a full choir, a chamber choir, chamber orchestra, and the Berlin Uni-Bigband.