Info text: Georg Friedrich Haas creates music of hypnotic power. Under the simple title ... and ... he forces ensemble and electronics, microtones and tempered systems together in his own unique way. In the premiere concert in September 2008, this turns into twenty-seven minutes of maximum excitement, created jointly by the SWR's Experimental Studio and the Collegium Novum Zurich under the direction of Enno Poppe. […]

Info text: The irrepressible power of pre-Columbian myths, reborn in a modern language. Stefan Asbury brings the WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne to a boil when Alberto Ginastera tells the creation story of the Mayas in his late work “Popol Vuh” (1975–83). The dramatic “Cantata para América Mágica” (1960), based on words by Mercedes de [...]

Info text: Markus Bellheim begins his recording of all of Olivier Messiaen's piano compositions with a major work in which the elements that are important for further work work together in an exemplary manner: Franciscan-influenced mysticism, synesthesia, the love of the voices of nature and the sharpening of awareness of foreign musical cultures with their diverse melodies and rhythms. In the “look of the prophets, the […]

Info text: Second NEOS recording with the fabulous Swiss clarinetist and composer Matthias Mueller Boris Tchaikovsky's Clarinet Concerto is presented here by NEOS as the first Western European recording. The work of the composer, who lived in the communist USSR, inspires with its Russian soul and playful insouciance. A concert far away from the Western European avant-garde trends that exudes joyful music with charm and nonchalance. Debussy's […]

Info text: Matthias Mueller impressively demonstrates that this wind instrument is suitable for virtuosity. Rossini's variations celebrate the romantic and bravura brilliance. The brand new clarinet concerto, which the Swiss soloist wrote for himself, focuses on tonal finesse and rhythmic variability. In the recorded solo works, these characteristics are taken to the extreme. In addition to the classics […]

Info text: “One hundred years of new music – what now?” The question thrown into the room by the organizer provokes different positions. Enno Poppe retreats to a dusty corner, Isabel Mundry to a philosophical hall of mirrors. Ben Johnston celebrates his late Donaueschinger debut with the “Quintet for groups”. Brice Pauset, Arnulf Herrmann and Bernhard Gander let their [...]

Info text: Borboudakis enjoys studying ancient mythology and philosophy as well as modern science and technology. For Peter Sadlo he wrote a drum concerto about “the primordial” (“Archégonon”), for the ensemble spectral a string quartet about “the number four” (“Tetractýs”) and a sextet about “alloys” (“Krámata”). In the “Photonic constructions” he argues with Ensemble Modern about the wave-particle dualism of light. […]

Info text: The Munich-born Paul Ben-Haim, once assistant to Bruno Walter and Knappertsbusch at the State Opera, then Kapellmeister in Augsburg, then unemployed and refugee, experienced a late rediscovery by the Munich Jakobsplatz Orchestra. Daniel Grossmann presents works from the years in which the composer was building a new life for himself in Israel: his “Sonata in G”, which he […]

Info text: Literary fixed stars stimulate Peter Ruzicka to continually explore new musical aspects. By reflecting on the language skepticism of Celan, Hofmannsthal and Hölderlin in his quartets, he examines his own thinking and feelings. Guided by a sharp, controlling mind, he dares to look inwards, into the depths of the soul. Violent emotional outbursts appear tied back to a […]

Info text: Consistent in her thinking and resistant to any form of opportunism, she had to remain silent in the Soviet Union for years, but she was not broken. Galina Ustvolskaya lived and survived in a narrow, narrow space. To call their music “protest” would be too short-sighted – it was simply “different”. The complete recording of her piano works by Sabine [...]

Info text: Musica Viva: Festival 2008 Top-class orchestras, choirs and soloists organized the first Musica Viva Festival together at the beginning of 2008. This selection of photographs shows perspectives and possible lines of tradition. “Symphonie L'Œuvre” (1937/38) by Karl Amadeus Hartmann, a plea for the freedom of thoughts and sounds, becomes a source of inspiration for contemporary confessional music: Matthias Pintscher’s “Hérodiade Fragments” […]

Info text: Andreas Grau and Götz Schumacher reach for the stars: A cold, glittering vision of the young Péter Eötvös of the growth and decay of the cosmos forms the center of their new recital, which is staged as a flight through musical worlds. Dance and song studies from Béla Bartók's “microcosm” are viewed longingly, as if from the distance of space. […]