Last
year's Donaueschingen Music Days were preceded
with a 'live' discussion, organised by Bavarian
Radio on 16 October, concerning the future
of the avant-garde. Among the participants
were Isabel Mundry and Georg Nussbaumer, representing,
respectively, concert music, and the increasing
trend towards installations and performance
art. They embodied the underlying theme of
the 2003 Music Days, and there was even an
attempt to combine the different media in
a single concertante event on 18 October which
was hardly the most enlightening experience
of the weekend.
However,
the repertoire was generally more successful
than in 2002. It did not reveal an obviously
outstanding work, but it ensured that most
of the concerts were memorable. In contrast
with recent years, the first orchestral concert
proved more rewarding than the concluding
concert. Apparently, some aspects of the performances
by the Philharmonic Orchestra of Radio France,
conducted by Emilio Pomarico, were criticised,
but the three works constituted a varied and
challenging programme. Appropriately, the
order of presentation reflected their increasing
significance, but in each case, the complexity
of the compositional process was largely justified.
Plongements,
by the Argentine-born Ricardo Nillni, opened
the proceedings. Initially, there were echoes
of Grisey's spectral music, and the complex
compositional processes, based on mathematical
models, were clearly derived from spectral
thought; but they were also sufficiently flexible
to enable Nillni to realise his own imaginative
ideas. A different background was reflected
in Walter Zimmermann's Subrisio saltat I,
for cello and orchestra. There was insufficient
variety to completely offset the minimalist
basis of Zimmermann's score, though there
was a sense of contrast between soloist and
orchestra which helped the work to evolve.
The composer's introductory note also suggested
an ironic dimension, stemming from early German
romanticism, but it would need a detailed
knowledge of Zimmermann's output, especially
his use of Franconian folk melodies, to fully
appreciate this aspect. The revised version
of Emmanuel Nunes' Nachtmusik II had more
explicit origins in an earlier work. Besides
being a revision of the earlier orchestral
score, which, in turn, was derived from Nachtmusik
I, both pieces were integral to a 'family'
of works with the overall title The Creation,
in that they shared the same rhythmic principle.
The latest manifestation of Nachtmusik II
clearly benefited from compositional procedures
the composer has refined over many years.
It was very much in the modernist tradition
for which Donaueschingen is best-known, but
also had an epic character, particularly in
the concluding pages, with their tolling bell-like
sonorities.
Two
concerts by smaller ensembles, concentrating
mainly on composers of the younger generation,
were also rewarding. Ensemble Mosaik, conducted
by Robert HP Platz, presented three relatively
unfamiliar composers whose training was sufficiently
rigorous to ensure that they created music
of genuine interest, notwithstanding the elaborate
technology at their disposal. Pierre Jodlowski
- a French composer with a strong bias towards
electronics - incorporated an eight-channel
sound system and interactive video into a
work for small ensemble. The integration was
generally successful, though the co-existence
between the worlds of new music and popular
culture was sometimes uneasy. Still, People
- Time compelled attention despite Jodlowski's
undue reliance on minimalist gestures. Arnulf
Herrmann's Panorama, for ensemble, 'live'
electronics, speaker, and interactive video
did not involve popular references. It lacked
the vitality and humour of Direkt Entrueckt,
introduced at Witten, but suggested that the
composer's future may lie mainly in music-theatre.
On the other hand, Enno Poppe's Rad, for two
keyboards, achieved the same level of inspiration
as his earlier scores. It demonstrated that
Poppe's harmonic language is sufficiently
developed to enable him to undertake a major
exploration of micro-intervals.
The
concert by Klangforum Wien, conducted by Fabrice
Bollon, was slightly less successful, by virtue
of one disappointing item, and another which
was not wholly convincing. The former was
Dror Feiler's Point Blank: written in anger,
apparently, but undermined by gratuitous aggression;
while Sergej Newski's Fluss, for speaker and
ensemble - an expressionist portrayal of mental
anguish - suffered from inadequate musical
support. Reinhard Fuchs' Blue Poles, for ensemble,
was slightly too long, but revealed another
talented Austrian composer. In contrast, James
Clarke's Final Dance was a model of concision.
Clarke favours pieces lasting approximately
ten minutes, and on the evidence of Final
Dance, this is the appropriate length for
his highly concentrated style.
There
were various forms of over-indulgence, and
several pieces suffered from undue exaggeration.
Vadim Karassikov's Beyond the Boundary of
Silence, for clarinet, violin and piano concentrated
on visual gestures, subjecting the audience
to half-an-hour of almost total silence as
the three players fiddled with their instruments.
It was deemed not worthy of broadcasting in
full.
Many
of the pieces presented under the collective
title, 'Musik fuer Hunde', were equally devoid
of genuine substance. For example, it was
difficult to discern the significance of Antoine
Beuger's 48-hour wort fuer wort (geraum),
consisting of sepulchral readings interspersed
with electronic sounds in an otherwise silent
environment. 'Musik fuer Hunde' was also devised
to unify the various strands of the Donaueschinger
Musiktage by encouraging composers and conceptual
artists to create a sequence of events that
could be realised in terms of installations,
performance pieces or concert items. One of
the themes - which was extended to some of
the concert pieces - was the relationship
between sound and noise. Rolf Julius' work
took the form of an installation; a performance
entitled Piano Concerto No. 2; and a concert
presentation, entitled Zwischen Schwarz und
Rot, in which noise predominated and there
was little distinction between ensemble and
electronics. Georg Nussbaumer's Von der Wiege
bis zum Graab emphasised noise to an even
greater degree. In keeping with the title,
he installed various objects at different
locations, designed to symbolise, sonically,
or visually, the life cycle, together with
environmental and other issues. This was the
basis of Part III of his overall scheme: an
elaborate wooden construction, in the form
of a galley, he contributed to the Concertante
event, but it needed an extended verbal explanation,
rather than the sounds themselves, to clarify
his concept. In comparison, Peter Ablinger's
Altar was more inventive. The starting-point
was a series of recordings made on one of
Donaueschingen's busiest crossroads. The second
stage was a complementary study, presented
at the Concertante event, while stage 3 was
Drei Minuten für Orchester, in which
an 'analysis' of 14 seconds of the original
recording was combined with the piano part
of the Complementary Study. Drei Minuten für
Orchester opened the final concert, given
by the Orchestra of South-West German Radio,
Freiburg and Baden-Baden, conducted by Sylvain
Cambreling, and, within its brief span, displayed
more invention than is customary in Ablinger's
orchestral scores. The original programme
comprised a further three recent works, but
Klaus K. Hubler's Vanitas did not appear until
the 2004 Eclat Festival, where it revealed
a considerable change of style from the composer's
earlier creations.
At Donaueschingen,
Vanitas was replaced by Chemins I, for harp
and chamber orchestra, in tribute to Luciano
Berio. It proved superior to the remaining
items. Nevertheless, the two first performances
merited serious consideration. Isabel Mundry's
Penelopes Atem, for female voice, accordion
and orchestral groups, was clearly the product
of a modernist sensibility. The piece was
inspired by contrasting city-scapes which
she interpreted as a metaphor for the wanderings
of Odysseus as opposed to the interior isolation,
within her own home, of Penelope. Hence the
contrast between voice and orchestra as each
sought to articulate its expressive content.
Penelopes Atem has been followed by Gefaecherter
Raum, for vocal and instrumental soloists,
instrumental ensemble, chorus and orchestra,
introduced on 5 March, as part of the current
Munich Musica Viva season. Together, they
suggest that Isabel Mundry's forthcoming opera,
based on The Odyssey, will be a work of considerable
significance. In comparison with Penelopes
Atem, Georg Friedrich Haas' Natures Mortes,
for orchestra, was less challenging and consequently
achieved a more immediate response. Haas'
recent output has not matched his earlier
achievements, though the outer sections of
Natures Mortes compelled attention by virtue
of his attempt to construct a harmonic language
from the overtone series. Unfortunately, the
central episode was monotonous, involving
two sequences of pulsations, whose timbre
was gradually changed over several minutes.
In the concluding passage, however, Haas was
far more imaginative, allowing the textures
to change with greater subtlety, so that the
piece came close to capturing the cantabile
manner mentioned in his programme note.
This
year's Karl Sczuka prize for a radiophonic,
or electroacoustic composition was won by
Asmus Tietchens, with Sechs Heidelberger Studien,
based on the sounds of old printing machines.
Lasting a little over 20 minutes, the piece
had the distinct merit of concision, yet managed
to explore a variety of different sonorities
and rhythms.
During
the weekend, Edition Zeitklang expanded their
range of discs with several new releases.
The Artistic Director is the composer Bernfried
Proeve, and the intention of Edition Zeitklang
Music Production is "to promote highly gifted
performers and composers and extraordinary
contemporary music ensembles on a broad basis
by publishing CD monographs. Another of our
concerns is to present new art forms on CD
..." The repertoire is not confined to contemporary,
or even 20th-century music, but the majority
of discs concentrate on recent developments.
For instance, there is a disc of microtonal
piano music; another is a portrait of Brian
Ferneyhough.
At the
same time, Col Legno issued an outstanding
new recording of Luigi Nono's Io: Frammento
da Prometeo and Das Atmende Klarsein, together
with the documentation discs of Donaueschingen,
2002. The three discs of the latter made possible
further consideration of most of the items,
but this only confirmed the impression that
the 2002 Donaueschingen Music Days would be
remembered for Klaus Huber's Die Seele Muss
vom Reittier steigen.
John Warnaby
As in previous years,
CDs from the 2003 festival will be released
during 2004.
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