"The day will come, we know not when" - of course, we all knew that even his reign oould not last forever. But I, like so many others, nevertheless hoped that Nikolaus Harnoncourt would celebrate his hunderedth birthday with a musical treat for us and, indeed, for himself. When he conducted a performance of Beethoven's Missa solemnis last summer, there was no way of knowing that this would bring the Salzburg Festival full circle, completing a cycle that began with a performance of that very work during Nikolaus Harnoncourt's debut at the Salzburg Festival back in 1992. Then as today, the performance was uncompromising, rousing and overwhelming. The news of his death on March 5, 2016, was met with profound sadness and grief throughout the music world, and it remains for us to remember with utmost gratitude all those highlights, truly unprecedented moments, that he gave to our festival throughout nearly a quarter-century.
I first met Nikolaus Harnoncourt in Salzburg in 1982. The director at the time, Frederik Mirdita, had staged a brilliant performance of Henry Purcell's Dido and Aeneas at the Salzburg Landestheater. I was immediately gripped by Harnoncourt's fiery enthusiasm. From then on I was part of the "happy community of discoverers" (to quote Nikolaus Harnoncourt), a union that he justifiably cherished.
Harnoncourt's career in Salzburg began on the other side of the River Salzach. From 1972 he taught performance practice and organology as a professor at The Mozarteum in Salzburg. It was during Mozart Week in 1980 that he first conducted a major orchestra in Austria, namely the Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam. The International Mozarteum Foundation was again responsible for his debut with the Vienna Philharmonic. After all, Herbert von Karajan did not want Hornoncourt to appear at the festival during his lifetime. Karajan and Harnoncourt stood at the poles of contrasting musical worlds. Howeyer, they did have one thing in common: both looked to bring out the truth in music; both remained seekers throughout their lives, but their searches took radically different paths.
1992 finally saw Nikolaus Harnoncourt step onto the podium at the Salzburg Festival for the first time. This was followed by outstanding concert highlights - including a complete Beethoven cycle - and unforgettable opera productions, such as L'incoronazione di Poppea, two productions of Mozart's Le nozze di Figaro as well as Don Giovanni and La clemenza di Tito. He always succeeded in fathoming out unknown elements within the supposedly familiar whilst allowing the seemingly wellknown to appear in a completely new light and uniting his listeners as a community of discoyerers.

"The opening concert featuring Monteverdi's L'incoronozione di Poppea turned out to be a personal triumph for conductor Nikolaus Harnoncourt," wrote Gerhard Rohde in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung of July 26, 1993.

Harnoncourt had many personal triumphs, yet this term strikes a false note. He was not out for personal triumph. His mission was art and truth. This is what made Nikolaus Harnoncourt so inspiring, so unique. "Art is a language that reveals hidden treasure, tears open the seals and makes the innermost keenly felt. It exhorts, recounts, moves and delights... Beauty in art includes opposites, its name is truth and it can be oppressive," postulated Harnoncourt in his keynote address opening the 1995 Salzburg Festival. It was a remarkable speech in which he showed no reluctance to point out unpleasant truths and admonish artists and audiences to be mindful of their respansibility.
Nikolaus Harnoncourt, that passionate torchbearer, will be missed. We miss him already.