Swiss oboist, conductor, and composer Heinz Holliger (b.1939) www.colbertartists.com/ArtistBio.asp?ID=heinz-holliger
began his musical education at the conservatories of Bern and Basel. He studied
composition with Sándor Veress and Pierre Boulez and was awarded first prize
for oboe in the International Competition in Geneva in 1959. Many composers, including
Olivier Messiaen, Luciano Berio, Elliott Carter, Frank Martin, Hans Werner
Henze, Witold Lutosławski, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Krzysztof Penderecki, and
Isang Yun, have written works for him.
As a conductor, Heinz Holliger has worked for many years
with leading orchestras and ensembles worldwide including the Berlin
Philharmonic, the Cleveland Orchestra, Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw Orchestra, the
London Philharmonia Orchestra, the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, the Vienna
Philharmonic Orchestra, the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the SWR Symphony
Orchestra of Baden-Baden/Freiburg and Stuttgart, the WDR Symphony Orchestra of
Cologne, the Frankfurt Symphony Orchestra, the Zürich Tonhalle Orchestra,
L’Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, the Chamber Orchestra of Lausanne, the
Budapest Festival Orchestra, the National Orchestra of Lyon, and the Strasbourg
Philharmonic, as well as his long standing collaboration with the Chamber
Orchestra of Europe.
Holliger is in high demand as a composer with his opera on
Robert Walser’s Schneewittchen at the
Zürich Opera House receiving great international attention. Other major works
are his Scardanelli-Zyklus, a
150-minute cycle for mixed forces and his Violin
Concerto. On the occasion of Paul Sacher's 70th birthday, Holliger was one
of twelve composer-friends of his who were asked by Russian cellist Mstislav
Rostropovich to write compositions for cello solo.
ECM Records www.ecmrecords.com have recently released a recording of Heinz Holliger’s Machaut-Transcriptions, performed by The
Hilliard Ensemble www.hilliardensemble.demon.co.uk
and the violists, Geneviève Strosser
www.kajimotomusic.com/en/artists/k=85/
, Jürg Dähler http://artsconsulting-int.com/en/downloads/aSc-int_CV_JD_engl.pdf
and Muriel Cantoreggi http://www.mh-freiburg.de/lehrende/person/details/cantoreggi
ECM NEW SERIES 2224 4765121 |
As well as his Messe
de Nostre Dame, the French composer and poet Guillaume de Machaut (c.1300-1377) composed many motets, ballades,
rondeaux, virelais and lais. Over a ten year period beginning in 2001Heinz
Holliger has written a cycle of pieces, scored for four voices and three violas,
entitled Machaut-Transkriptionen, an
imaginative re-investigation of the work of the Guillaume de Machaut. Note-for-note
transcriptions of Machaut give way to Holliger’s increasingly creative
refractions of the music. Holliger has
stated that his in-depth study of Machaud opened up new vistas for his
compositional activity.
The Hilliard Ensemble find many little nuances in the
opening note for note transcription in natural harmonics of Machaut’s Ballade IV Biaute qui toutes autre pere finding
a strangely modern flavour as though stretching Machaut’s harmonic language.
Violists Geneviève Strosser, Jürg Dähler and Muriel
Cantoreggi bring natural harmonics in the opening of Ballade IV für drei Violen. For all its strange sounds there is a
definable link to the harmonies of Machaut. It is quite incredible how these players
weave the delicate harmonies demonstrating just how much Holliger has absorbed
Machaut’s harmonic world.
The Hilliards return for the original setting by Machaut’s Ballade XXVI Donnez, Seigneur bringing a
lovely gentle sway, with fine harmonisation and a high level of accuracy.
In Holliger’s transcription of Ballade XXVI für drei Violen for three violas the music slowly
emerges, overlaying the original with harmonics, a true blending of ideas
separated by over 600 years. The music has a mournful sound as the original
appears to glimmer and reflect through the strange harmonies drawing the ear in
an unexpectedly intense way.
The Hilliards bring Machaut’s original Double Hoquet (Hoquetus David) with its constantly shifting rhythms
and harmonies, these fine singers providing a terrific flexibility, negotiating
every little turn beautifully.
With Holliger’s transcription of Triple Hoquet (nach Hoquetus David) he dissects Machaut’s original to
an extent that the particles seem to reform in an entirely new way. Holliger
speaks of ‘quasi atomising’ the motivic units. Yet oddly one can still sense an
affinity with Machaut without necessarily being able to define why. The music
becomes increasingly more complex with pizzicato phrases, harmonics and edgy
motifs. But equally as it progresses, there are some intensely fine dissonant
harmonies before clearing towards the coda for a settled conclusion. This is a terrific
performance from these three violists.
The Hilliard Ensemble bring a quite spectacularly fine Lay VII für vier Stimmen (for four
voices) where Machaut’s music is spread out into a wider or, in Holliger’s
terms spacialisated array of harmonics. There are some fiendishly difficult parts
to sing with these fine voices bringing some stunningly controlled singing.
Here the 14th c. refracts through a more advanced prism with some
lovely subtle little dissonances, a quite wonderful transcription of Machaut’s
original. Holliger weaves and blends the musical lines, finding some wonderful
textures and sonorities and some quite lovely moments before arriving at a
particularly mellifluous coda but concluding on a dissonance. The performance
is a triumph.
In(ter)ventio a 3 für
drei Violen brings the return of the three violists in this thematically
related improvisation on Machaut’s Complainte
(Tels rit au main qui au soir). Here
there are constantly shifting harmonies and moments of complex agitation with spectacularly
accomplished playing from these violists. Later there is a mysterious, slow,
hushed section where the violas slowly rise and fall around each other in a quite
mesmerising passage before slowly moving forward through harmonies that often
shimmer to slowly sink into a hushed coda.
The Hilliard Ensemble come together with the violists
Geneviève Strosser, Jürg Dähler and Muriel Cantoreggi for Complainte (aus:
Remede de Fortune) und Epilog für vier Singstimmen und drei Violen. Here
Machaut’s original Complainte is
reworked as a four part canon over which a ¼ tone three part invention is laid,
weaving strange harmonies out of which little motifs for strings and voices
emerge. Often there are little dynamic surges for voices as the music moves through
some wonderfully unusual harmonies and dissonance. The music falls to a hush
before the voices take the music forward alone, rising to some very fine
passages. A viola quietly joins using harmonics high in its register before the
other violas join to spread out around the voices before sinking to a quiet
coda.
This is a terrific achievement by all these performers.
These are strikingly impressive transcriptions, occasionally
challenging but more often quite beautiful.
The performances could not be bettered. The recording is excellent
and there are useful booklet notes by Andreas Krause and Heinz Hollliger. There
are no texts provided.
I cannot recommend this disc too highly. There are so many
wonderful moments throughout.
See also:
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