Here it is: the full study score of Karlheinz Stockhausen’s Carré for orchestra I. The work for 4 orchestras and choirs will be performed tomorrow, 28 March, at the Cité de la Musique.
Michel Tabachnik, Ulrich Pöhl, Nathalie Marin and Kaisa Roose conduct the Brussels Philharmonic and Les Cris de Paris (choirmaster: Geoffroy Jourdain).
View the full score:
Pierre Boulez at the Venice Biennale, where he was awarded the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement in October 2012.
Happy 89th Birthday Pierre Boulez!
Ivan Fedele, director of the Biennale’s music sector, on Boulez:
“This is a recognition of the absolute value of an artist who has lived through the history of contemporary music, offering the entire world compositions that, in the opinion of musicologists and artists from around the world, are true masterpieces of modernity.
The Maestro’s work has also expressed itself in the theoretical field with exemplary books that have served as a guide and model for generations of young composers. Furthermore, as a conductor, Boulez has offered interpretations of the classical and contemporary repertoire that are now considered milestones.”
Watch the Trailer for Onyx Brass’ Tour de Brass, a series of free, outdoor concerts across the UK. On the programme: David Sawer’s Bronze and Iron for brass quintet with bandstand.
View the full study score of Bronze and Iron:
Karlheinz Stockhausen’s Carré for 4 orchestras and 4 choirs will be performed on 28 March at the Cité de la Musique. Michel Tabachnik, Ulrich Pöhl, Nathalie Marin and Kaisa Roose will conduct the Brussels Philharmonic and Les Cris de Paris (choirmaster: Geoffroy Jourdain).
Stockhausen on Carré:
This piece does not tell a story. Each moment can stand on its own. One must take ones time if one wishes to absorb this music. Most of the changes take place very discreetly INSIDE the tones. I hope that this music may afford a little inner stillness, breadth and concentration; the consciousness that we have much time if we take it – that it is better to come to oneself than get beside oneself, for the things that happen need someone to happen to; someone has to catch them.
Karlheinz Stockhausen: Carré
for 4 orchestras and 4 choirs (4 conductors) | 36'
28.03.2014, Cité de la Musique, Paris; Brussels Philharmonic; Les Cris de Paris; cond. Michel Tabachnik, Ulrich Pöhl, Nathalie Marin, Kaisa Roose
John Fulljames, Associate Director of Opera for the Royal Opera House, introduces the ROH’s A Faustian Pack programme. Watch John Fulljames and sound artist Matthew Herbert talk about the project and view rehearsal photos from Luke Bedford’s upcoming opera Through His Teeth:
Ruth Padel recently joined the rehearsals for Bedford’s Through His Teeth, which she describes as a “Faust without the supernatural. The evil is all human. But there’s lots of it: demonic sex, demonic fraud, demonic psychological abuse.”
Read the full text on Ruth Padel’s blog.
Find out more about Through His Teeth on our dedicated blog.
Happy Birthday and congratulations on receiving the Kieler Kulturpreis 2014!
The Kiel Opera House and Cristóbal Halffter can look back on a long and highly successful collaboration: two of Halffter’s three operas (Schachnovelle and Lázaro) were commissioned by the Opera House, and his Don Quijote celebrated its first German performance there. The award ceremony will take place on 29 June.
Read more on the website of the Kiel Opera House [German].
Cristóbal Halffter on Schachnovelle:
Geoffrey Norris of The Telegraph has reviewed the Dante Quartet’s recent recording of Zoltán Kodály’s String Quartets Nos. 1 and 2, Intermezzo and Gavotte, stating that the Quartet “responds both subtly and animatedly to Zoltán Kodály's piquant, passionate music.”
Read the full review on The Telegraph.
The CD has been released on Hyperion.
A new production of Leoš Janáček’s The Cunning Little Vixen [Příhody lišky Bystroušky] will première today, 20 March 2014, at the National Theatre in Prague. Janáček’s opera will be performed at the theatre for the first time in the last ten years and is the theatre’s contribution to the Czech Music Year programme.
For more information about the opera and the full cast, visit the National Theatre’s website.
Leoš Janáček: The Cunning Little Vixen
opera in 3 acts | 110'
4 3 3 3 - 4 3 3 1 - timp, perc(2), hp, cel, str
20.03.2014, National Theatre, Prague; Czech National Opera Chorus; Czech National Opera Orchestra, cond. Robert Jindra; Stage Director: Ondřej Havelka
Today 60 years ago – on 19 March 1954 – Walter Braunfels passed away.
His opera Die Vögel (The Birds), which was premièred on 30 November 1920 by Bruno Walter in Munich’s National Theatre, was a sensational success and proved to be his musical breakthrough. The opera was the most successful world première of the National Theatre of Munich in the 20th century: 50 performances followed 1921 and 1922.
The composer described the opera as “a lyrical, fantastical game”, for Bruno Walter it was “one of the most interesting new works” of his time in Munich, and the critic Alfred Einstein, who compared the opera with Wagner’s Meistersinger [The Mastersingers] and Pfitzner’s Palestrina, saw it as “a work of yearning for the pure realm of fantasy, art, poetry, and at once a fulfilment of this yearning, a leap into a world beyond time and bias.”
Other works such as Phantastische Erscheinungen eines Themas von Hector Berlioz (Fantastic Appearances of a Theme by Hector Berlioz), Te Deum, Don Gil von den Grünen Hosen (Don Gil of the Green Trousers), the Grosse Messe(Grand Mass) and Don Juan were performed by renowned conductors such as Wilhelm Furtwängler, Otto Klemperer and Max von Schillings and soon became part of the repertoire of almost all German theatres and concert halls, making him one of the most widely performed opera composers of 1920’s Germany.
Read more about Walter Braunfels and listen to excerpts of his music on his dedicated page.
The French pianist Sarah Lavaud has devoted her first solo CD Dans les Brumes to Leoš Janáček’s most well-known piano pieces together with several late pages characteristic of his mature style.
Lavaud has been described by Jean-Claude Pennetier as “one of those interpreters for whom the rendering of each musical phrase or idea is a vital commitment.”
Dans les Brumes will be released on 19 March on Editions Hortus and includes the eponymous In the Mists, the Sonata IX, On an Overgrown Path, A Recollection and excerpts from Intimate Sketches.
The Camerata RCO of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra has started a crowdfunding project for a CD recording of Mahler’s Symphony No. 9 in the arrangement of Klaus Simon. Find out more about the project here.
I do not see myself as a “choral” composer, though I have written quite a lot for choir.
It’s Choral Month on Bachtrack, and for that occasion the online magazine (and event finder) has conducted a short interview with Arvo Pärt, whom they revealed as the most performed contemporary composer of 2013.
Read the full article here.
Brass and Iron and Alphorns: our latest newsletter is now online.
All is well at the Frankfurt Music Fair, the international fair for musical instruments, sheet music, music production and music business connections. The Musikmesse is the world's leading trade fair for the world of music. Here you will find a complete range of products with everything required for making music, not to mention innumerable workshops, concerts, demonstrations and discussion events.
Come and meet us at Universal Edition’s Stand (Hall 3.1 Stand C42).
Here's a selection of our new publications. In the centre there is Klaus Dickbauer’s new Groove Connection – the cool way to practice.
We’re also present at the Leipzig book fair, but more on that soon.
Here is the Irish Times’ take on last week’s New Music Dublin Festival, which took place at the National Concert Hall. The festival was attended by Harrison Birtwistle, who was on stage for a pre-performance discussion and gave a public interview.
On the programme were, among other works, Georg Friedrich Haas’ String Quartet No. 1 and “In iij. Noct.”,and Birtwistle’s Earth Dances.
Read the full article on the Irish Times.
Another review of the festival ist available on Golden Plec: “The [Arditti Quartet’s] performances are beyond belief, with a scintillating sound and commitment to the music” - congratulations!