Klebe was born in Mannheim
in 1925 and studied with Kurt von Wolfurt,
Josef Rufer and later with Boris Blacher.
His Op 1, a Divertimento, was first
performed in 1947, and Kliebe formed
a professional friendship with Wolfgang
Fortner and had works premiered at Darmstadt.
As an academic Klebe was a senior composition
lecturer in Detmold and was also president
of the Berlin Academy of Arts. This
is the second of Marco Polo’s series
dedicated to the Klebe piano music.
Sometimes elliptical,
sometimes aggressive but opening with
portentous gravity the Poèma
drammatico is a homage to Verdi
and embeds quotations from such as Otello,
Macbeth and Il trovatore into the score.
This is pungent and astringent, never
ascetic, and carries a charge of forbidding
abruptness, from which the quotations
emerge not as impositions but as part
of the syntax. Certainly not an easy
work to like, despite the obvious veneration
Klebe feels for Verdi, and one that
spins on its darker axis. Soggetto cavato
primo and secundo have variously propulsive
energy and dense textures. Klebe wrote
Widmungen for composer and musician
friends – the word means Dedications.
That for Christiane and Axel Eggers
(No.2) – is elliptical and still, No.3
is considered, thoughtful and concentrated
(for the 60th birthday of
Karl Schumann) whilst No.4 for Aribert
Riemann is much more animated. A fine
evocative set well played by Christian
Köhn.
The Angry Songs without
Words (Zornige Lieder ohne Worte
– poor Mendelssohn) are titled Anger,
Loneliness, Sorrow, Revolt and Secret
Message. These are precisely and imaginatively
calibrated miniatures – angular, full
of forlorn spaces, cryptically repetitive;
allusive and clever. The works for the
composer’s grandchildren are altogether
lighter and the Variations are logical
and wide ranging.
The notes are by the
composer and the performances are tangibly
engaged.
Jonathan Woolf
see also review
by Hubert Culot
Silke-Thora Matthies and Christian Köhn
(pianos) and 
