SKU: CA.2090100
ISBN 9790007037284.
Thanks to a stipend from his patron, the Landgrave Moritz von Hessen-Kassel, Schutz was able to pursue a three-year period of study under Giovanni Gabrieli in Venice from 1609 to 1612, which he concluded with the publication in 1611 of the madrigal collection Il Primo Libro de Madrigali. Already in this, his Opus primus, Schutz emerged as an outstanding composer: In their musical quality, the 18 five-part madrigals exceed much that was still being composed in the traditional madrigal style at the beginnning of the 17th century.
SKU: BT.EMBZ15150
English-German-Hungarian.
The piano series entitled Games, written from 1973 onwards, was conceived as a piano method. As the years went by, the series lost its didactic character, at it came to be seen as a document from Kurtág's workshop, offering a key to his grander symphonic, chamber and vocal works as well.Tenth volume is divided into two parts: In the first half, earlier, hitherto unpublished pieces line up from Suite, written in 1943, to the 1980s, providing insight into the development of Kurtág's musical language. The second half includes pieces composed between 2002 and 2011. The movements, often aphorismic in their briefness, hide associations with various aspects of European music history.Many of them are hommage or in memoriam pieces, or subjective personal messages to friends, colleagues, and beloved family members - and thereby to all music-loving people. This publication is printed on high quality, durable paper made from renewable raw materials in an environmentally friendly way.
SKU: HL.49018099
ISBN 9790001158428. UPC: 884088567347. 8.25x11.75x0.457 inches. Latin - German.
On letting go(Concerning the selection of the texts) In the selection of the texts, I have allowed myself to be motivated and inspired by the concept of 'letting go'. This appears to me to be one of the essential aspects of dying, but also of life itself. We humans cling far too strongly to successful achievements, whether they have to do with material or ideal values, or relationships of all kinds. We cannot and do not want to let go, almost as if our life depended on it. As we will have to practise the art of letting go at the latest during our hour of death, perhaps we could already make a start on this while we are still alive. Tagore describes this farewell with very simple but strikingly vivid imagery: 'I will return the key of my door'. I have set this text for tenor solo. Here I imagine, and have correspondingly noted in a certain passage of the score, that the protagonist finds himself as though 'in an ocean' of voices in which he is however not drowning, but immersing himself in complete relaxation. The phenomenon of letting go is described even more simply and tersely in Psalm 90, verse 12: 'So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom'. This cannot be expressed more plainly.I have begun the requiem with a solo boy's voice singing the beginning of this psalm on a single note, the note A. This in effect says it all. The work comes full circle at the culmination with a repeat of the psalm which subsequently leads into a resplendent 'lux aeterna'. The intermediate texts of the Requiem which highlight the phenomenon of letting go in the widest spectrum of colours originate on the one hand from the Latin liturgy of the Messa da Requiem (In Paradisum, Libera me, Requiem aeternam, Mors stupebit) and on the other hand from poems by Joseph von Eichendorff, Hermann Hesse, Rabindranath Tagore and Rainer Maria Rilke.All texts have a distinctive positive element in common and view death as being an organic process within the great system of the universe, for example when Hermann Hesse writes: 'Entreiss dich, Seele, nun der Zeit, entreiss dich deinen Sorgen und mache dich zum Flug bereit in den ersehnten Morgen' ['Tear yourself way , o soul, from time, tear yourself away from your sorrows and prepare yourself to fly away into the long-awaited morning'] and later: 'Und die Seele unbewacht will in freien Flugen schweben, um im Zauberkreis der Nacht tief und tausendfach zu leben' ['And the unfettered soul strives to soar in free flight to live in the magic sphere of the night, deep and thousandfold']. Or Joseph von Eichendorff whose text evokes a distant song in his lines: 'Und meine Seele spannte weit ihre Flugel aus. Flog durch die stillen Lande, als floge sie nach Haus' ['And my soul spread its wings wide. Flew through the still country as if homeward bound.']Here a strong romantically tinged occidental resonance can be detected which is however also accompanied by a universal spirit going far beyond all cultures and religions. In the beginning was the sound Long before any sort of word or meaningful phrase was uttered by vocal chords, sounds, vibrations and tones already existed. This brings us back to the music. Both during my years of study and at subsequent periods, I had been an active participant in the world of contemporary music, both as percussionist and also as conductor and composer. My early scores had a somewhat adventurous appearance, filled with an abundance of small black dots: no rhythm could be too complicated, no register too extreme and no harmony too dissonant. I devoted myself intensely to the handling of different parameters which in serial music coexist in total equality: I also studied aleatory principles and so-called minimal music.I subsequently emigrated and took up residence in Spain from where I embarked on numerous travels over the years to India, Africa and South America. I spent repeated periods during this time as a resident in non-European countries. This meant that the currents of contemporary music swept past me vaguely and at a great distance. What I instead absorbed during this period were other completely new cultures in which I attempted to immerse myself as intensively as possible.I learned foreign languages and came into contact with musicians of all classes and styles who had a different cultural heritage than my own: I was intoxicated with the diversity of artistic potential.Nevertheless, the further I distanced myself from my own Western musical heritage, the more this returned insistently in my consciousness.The scene can be imagined of sitting somewhere in the middle of the Brazilian jungle surrounded by the wailing of Indians and out of the blue being provided with the opportunity to hear Beethoven's late string quartets: this can be a heart-wrenching experience, akin to an identity crisis. This type of experience can also be described as cathartic. Whatever the circumstances, my 'renewed' occupation with the 'old' country would not permit me to return to the point at which I as an audacious young student had maltreated the musical parameters of so-called contemporary music. A completely different approach would be necessary: an extremely careful approach, inching my way gradually back into the Western world: an approach which would welcome tradition back into the fold, attempt to unfurl the petals and gently infuse this tradition with a breath of contemporary life.Although I am aware that I will not unleash a revolution or scandal with this approach, I am nevertheless confident as, with the musical vocabulary of this Requiem, I am travelling in an orbit in which no ballast or complex structures will be transported or intimated: on the contrary, I have attempted to form the message of the texts in music with the naivety of a 'homecomer'. Harald WeissColonia de San PedroMarch 2009.
SKU: CA.925600
ISBN M-007-24918-2. Key: D major. German. Text: Morike, Eduard.
Hugo Wolf set a total of 53 songs by Eduard Morike, all in the year 1888. The composer wrote in a letter: Once you have heard this song, it can only inspire one wish - to die. In the artistic-metaphysical milieu of the late 19th century this was regarded as the highest ideal, especially for Hugo Wolf, who believed in the body as a wretched piano case from which the soul can only break free like harmonies dying away. And yet Fussreise (Journey on Foot) begins as a simple, happy, elated song of travel, revolving around the key of D major over an ostinato piano rhythm. Old Adam believes he senses the bliss of paradise in this, but he continues to be caught in the tension between earthly suffering and eternal longing, as the rest of Hugo Wolf's setting clearly shows: it remains a pious hope that a whole life would be such a morning journey bathed in gentle perspiration. These art songs were originally composed not for chamber choir, but for solo voice and piano. Denis Rouger has carefully adapted them to suit the requirements and expressive possibilities offered by a larger ensemble, without losing the any of the qualities of the original in the process. Each part in the choir has a melodic line drawn from the harmonic and rhythmic framework. In the process, the variety and refinement of the choral language combines with an enormous flexibility in form and expression, as French melodies or German art song demand from a soloist and pianist. The songs have been recorded by the figure humaine chamber choir on the CD Kennst du das Land ... (Carus 83.495).
SKU: CA.2300400
ISBN 9790007240783. English/German. Text: Newman, John Henry.
This is the best of me, wrote Edward Elgar after the final measure of his Dream of Gerontius. Premiered in 1900, in Great Britain the work has long been a standard work in the repertoire of large oratorio choirs. Elgar's moving, poetic setting of the eponymous poem by Cardinal John Henry Newman is about a dying man and his journey beyond death to God. Before the eyes of the listeners, a musical image of the soul is created which flies past mocking demons to God with its protecting angel at its side, is allowed to look at God briefly, then faces the purgatory confident and comforted. The work is a real rarity in the history of oratorio, and for large choirs it is a thrilling alternative to the established repertoire of Requiem settings. Its popularity is thanks to the suggestive, often sensuous power of the music, the great choral scenes of the demons and the angels, and the three impressive solo parts.All previous editions were reprints based on the historic first printed materials, which are inconsistent. By contrast, Carus has produced a modern, newly-engraved edition, compatible in all sections, which takes all the sources into consideration and evaluates the autograph manuscript in detail. For this edition the complete orchestral material is available on sale, and the vocal score and full score contain both English and German singing texts. The full score is also available digitally.*,A milestone of late Romantic choral music, and a standard work in Great Britain*,First modern score with a full Critical Report and complete performance material- English and german singing texts
