RENÉ WOHLHAUSER – QUANTUM FLOW
piano quartet
version for flute, clarinet, cello and piano (1979/83–84, partially revised 1987), Ergon 9b
Im piano quartet an attempt was made to compose the depth dimension, which led to a short duration of the music, to a kind of »texture polyphony«.
This contrasts with the illumination of the tonal antagonists, who only come together in the pitchless parts, but otherwise create their own micro-time over long stretches of the time axis, which manifests itself in a kind of "transitive layer superimposition".
An attempt was made to suggest a sense of »time shift« through a network of proportional relations, which are reflected in unusual, mutually shifting sub-time signatures.
The registers are assigned asynchronously to these processes in the sense of superimposed pass filter functions.
duometry
for flute(s) and bass clarinet (1985–86), Ergon 12
The title duometry points out that I composed the entire music of this duo from the predetermined meters, i. H. developed from the previously determined time signatures; in such a way that all musical forms in the sense of a (perhaps somewhat utopian) hermetic (self-contained) aesthetics should develop as dynamic processes of their own, so to speak, from a few presupposed ordering premises.
The way in which time was shaped and structured was certainly significantly influenced by the way I dealt with the philosophical aspects of time at the time.
For example through the imaginary concept of time. Imaginary is what the brilliant English physicist Stephen Hawking called in his book A Brief History of Time the imaginary direction of time that is also vertical to the horizontal, linear time, so that in the resulting closed area without beginning or end both the laws of nature and the principle of indeterminacy (i.e. both order and chaos) are conceivable at the same time, because this area in its infinity is almost takes on a kind of spherical shape.
This imaginary direction of time is linked to the complex dramaturgical organization of time in the piece and is expressed, among other things, in the fact that the time for both players is not synchronous, since they very often have to play different tempos against each other at the same time.
flight of thought
for cello and piano (1995), Ergon 22
Different moods that flow into each other. A piece about being distracted by the daily flood of information. About discontinuities and breaks in lives that the human mind would like to bend into continuities. The search for the red thread that holds our life together because we can't stand the mental falling apart into particular moments of experience.
The wealth of ideas, a creative blessing on the one hand, but which can also become a burden on the other hand when a composer or writer is looking for unity of thought. The fear of letting our thoughts drift insanely, neurotically, which, however, together with erratic (lateral) thinking, could lead us to new insights if we dared to allow it. The fear of leaving the orderly paths of everyday activities and exposing ourselves to the unknown and the unpredictable. Can art show us new ways in this regard?
In the compositional process, this corresponds to the dialectic between slowed-down intuitive improvisation on the one hand and strict planning construction and deterministic procedures on the other. The crisis of analytical rationality could lead to the fact that, due to the irritations of perception, the formal categories of orientation disappear into the flux and make room for new forms of listening experience, which in turn would make it possible to discover enigmatic meaningfulness in the subtext of dynamically flowing streams of power.
quantum flow
version for flute, cello and piano (1996/97), Ergon 23b
According to Gilles Deleuze, "quantum flow" refers to the transition from one energy state to another. Of the different forms of energy in this piece, I was particularly interested in the potential and kinetic energy: From which situation and state of mind or energy density and energy transformation ability is an energy potential charged that is able to set a process in motion? In this piece, the gravitation of these energy fields is suggested by a formal cyclic structure, realized by a grammar of correspondences.
Energeia and Dynamis describe the effective quantum of potency as a principle of movement and change. According to Aristotle, energeia is “the real activity of the possible”, while dynamis is “that which is according to its ability”: reality as a goal-oriented force of transformation.
In the piece itself there are opposing movement tendencies that are intended to build up dialectical tension: for example, faster tempos in quiet passages and a slowdown in more moving sections. Biomorphic structures, amoeba-like but precise figurations in the interplay of rigorous and freer parts shape the micro-sphere, while the technique of independent planes and the technique of merging planes contrast on a larger scale. Different degrees of density such as complexity and transparency result in contrasting expressive values, which nevertheless follow the principle of a congruent aesthetic through the conscious design of the stylistic environment.
In music, the observation and design of fragile transitional states not only affects physical, philosophical and compositional energy quanta, but also spiritual energy quanta. The energy of the streams of thought between confusion and liberation. The merging of open consciousness into the dissolution of light pouring down within us. The spread of the light sound in its transparent form in space. The transcendence in limitless light.
The dissolution of time into space
version for clarinet / bass clarinet, cello and piano (2000–2001/2011), Ergon 26f, musical work number 1607
How can musical time be experienced in a different state of consciousness?
As a composer, how do I get the most direct access possible to the uncontrollable musical subconscious?
How can a process on a differentiated structural level and in a primitive time design be developed from this peculiar emotional archaic at the same time?
What possibilities are there for translating a free-floating, improvisational rhythm directly into precisely fixed, codified musical notation, and to do this without getting lost in highly complex notation, but using a conventional notation that is unconventionally structured?
How can one still compose for piano today so that the piano sounds like a new instrument? (But without resorting to preparations and electronic transformations?) The beginning of the piece arose from this question.
How can existential experiences be expressed with musical means? Searching, trying again and again, starting anew, listening to yourself. The sluggish flow of the daily struggle for survival. When all auxiliary constructions fail. If all that remains is the improvisational groping in a confusingly complex environment, trust in your own sensitivity.
Aware of these questions, I have tried to develop methods that are able to convert intuition into musical expression without using coarsening grids. The interrelationship between becoming and losing consciousness, as Derrida describes deconstructivism and how I think I can sense it in the current zeitgeist. A process of complex fragmentation. Shards of sound that don't fit together, but that have to live together and create music at the abyss of themselves. A process of dissolution, a kind of deconstructivism of time, in which the familiar experience is lost in infinity.
What is meant here is not only a geographical-physical spatiality, but also a sonic one. Namely, the depth dimension of the sound space, which can only unfold in time, in which space and time come together and merge into one another.
A piece about the vanishing of the experience of time in the infinity of space.
Study of states and time processes
for flute and piano (2007), Ergon 35, music work number 1351
Measured time, perceived time, frozen time. From movement to temporal standstill. This path is covered in several stages or states, with particular attention being paid to the formal timing, i. H. the relationship between the nature of the material and its duration.
This material explores the fringes of the sound of both instruments, but without recurring to the noises that are fashionable in contemporary music, instead an attempt is made to track down the tonal fringes within normal tone production. (For example, with the flute, extremely short tone durations, so that the impression of a dying sound is created that can never really ring out. Or with the piano, a preference for the lowest register, in which the sound dominates over the distinct pitch.)
In the first part: Precisely defined number of tones in tone sequences, predetermined lengths of pauses and sections, melodic directionality. The pitches, generated by means of strict algorithmic processes, are severely constrained in their movements so that the listener's attention is directed to the other processes (compression-thinning, register filtering, etc.). The factual, directionless radicalism, sober and uncompromising, as well as hard film cuts prevent any indulgence. The structure is reduced to the essentials. However: the more strictly the structure is defined, the more it tends towards ambivalence, towards tipping over into structurelessness. As a result, the strictly defined structural corset is gradually reduced to absurdity.
In the second part: Open timelessness. Meditative sound design. Freely associative and yet with dense structural references.
In the third part: Freezing the sound.
It is a play on human perception in relation to the passage of time, in that human perception likes to create connections where almost none exist. How are which fields combined by whom to form which units of meaning? Thus the longest rest of the piece (over 13 seconds from bars 136–140) separates identical material into separate sections, while conversely, contrasting materials are forced together into common sections. Just a study about conditions and time processes and their perception.
Ly Gue Tin
a (not entirely serious) sounding work monograph for voice(s) and piano sounds, composed for the inauguration of Jean Tinguely's life tables in Basel on his 83rd birthday (May 22, 1925 - August 30, 1991), based on his own onomatopoeic texts (2008 ), Ergon 38, music work number 1493
The world-famous iron sculptor Jean Tinguely was born in Basel. He is best known for his mobile, machine-like sculptures, some of which are reminiscent of strange human movement patterns from the world of work. He assembled his engine-driven machine sculptures from wire, sheet metal and all sorts of other found objects and scrap elements, thereby reflecting human society and its mountains of waste in an often witty and playful way.
Just as Tinguely took individual elements from the real world and combined them into surreal constructions, I took individual phonetic elements from the real world of language and combined them into a surreal artificial language, with its own language coloring, a specific language rhythm and associative echoes existing languages. And I proceeded in the same way when it came to composition. Amorphous sounds and twitching, mechanical movement patterns collide and form strange connections. The variety of Tinguely's representational sculptures is reflected in the variety of the musical sculptures, which, despite their disparate nature, bizarrely push for common expression and communication.
Rene Wohlhauser
