Where did the inspiration for your piece "The Key to Songs" come from?
That was more than 30 years ago; at that time, from the late '70s until the '80s, ballet companies were doing my music. Every piece I wrote that was recorded was done by ballet companies all over the world. I loved seeing them, and I wanted to write a piece for ballet, but they never commissioned any, because they just took my music after I wrote it and danced to it. So I decided that I would write an imaginary ballet. I got a book by Max Ernst, one of the collage books, Une Semaine de Bonté (1933) and I took pictures from it. It was like photographs of a dancer flying through the air.
It was a surreal book, so there were very strange, surreal poems underneath each of the pictures.

I imagined what the ballet would have been like before and after he was up in the air and I made the music and my own choreography.

One of the pictures in Ernst's book was called The Key to Songsand it had nothing but little dots, no words. To me "The Key to Songs" was Schubert. So I picked a fragment by a Schubert song, you hear it, the strings play it often, and it gradually turns into something else. And I used that for the title The Key to Songs.
The funny thing is that once recorded it became a ballet! (smiling). 3 or 4 companies were dancing to that. I eventually wrote 3 imaginary ballets and they all got choreographed!

For conductor and music teacher Martin Studer, music is a "school of life". This is especially true of his work with the New Zurich Orchestra, which he founded 25 years ago. The Viennese pianist Paul Badura-Skoda was certainly impressed by the freshness of the young musicians in this orchestra, which inspired his own playing as a soloist. The Duo Praxedis also sparkled with ideas when mother and daughter opened up new repertoire for this instrumentation on harp and piano. Each brought their own heartfelt concerns to a joint concert tour initiated by Studer to Graz, Vienna, Bern, Zurich and Zug.
For this occasion, Studer had united his New Zurich Orchestra with the highly motivated amateurs of the University of Bern Alumni Orchestra, with the aim of forming a productive whole from professionals and enthusiastic amateurs and thus enabling an intensive community experience. The plan worked and caused storms of applause - not only at the Vienna Musikverein! Bedřich Smetana's symphonic poem The Moldau made all the qualities of this constellation clear at the start: it's not about slick perfection, but all the more emotion.
 

Paul Badura-Skoda first played Mozart's C minor Piano Concerto K. 491 in the 1950s and has played it several times since then. So the almost 90-year-old pianist brought one of his favorite works into this great whole. Even during the last rehearsal, he gave clear instructions to the orchestra from the piano - for example, where the woodwinds could follow the melodic lines of the piano even more closely. So much productive cooperation clears the way for the magic of the moment! Badura-Skoda raises his voice on the Bösendorfer out of great drama. The effect is charismatic and forceful, at the same time deeply restful. This piano concerto in particular in such an interpretation shows that Mozart's music is much richer than simply "beautiful". Badura-Skoda expresses his thanks for the great applause with the fragile and playful Adagio for glass harmonica.

Praxedis Genviève Hug and Praxedis Hug-Rütti are as symbiotically committed to each other on the harp and piano as their family ties would suggest. Their productivity is exuberant and their natural enthusiasm exudes an infectious charm. For this concert program, they have breathed new life into the double concerto by the now little-known British early Romantic composer Elias Parish Alvars. Hardly any other music could convey Mozart's gesture more aptly and light-footedly. Not as ambivalent and profound as Badura-Skoda, the Praxedis ladies communicate with Studer's orchestra in a light-flooded and at times very waltz-like manner.
 

But this is not enough of an ambitious project! Martin Studer has been working on Franz Schubert's Symphony in B minor, the so-called Unfinishedexplored. His love for the stirring melodies fueled his desire to redeem Schubert's late masterpiece from its incomplete status. So, after meticulous analytical work, he developed the existing material further. This ultimately resulted in a new third movement and a finale. Even when listened to critically, the result seems to have been cast from a single mold. Because one thing was particularly important to Studer: full respect for Schubert's musical language and no "interference" with his own ideas. The conductor and arranger confirmed in conversation: "I did everything the way I think Schubert would have done it."

Studer's conducting spurred everyone involved in this world premiere to top form at the Vienna Musikverein. The dark emotions are reliably captivating and build up to shattering climaxes. In the midst of all this turmoil, however, there is a great deal of tenderness - and the basis for this is not technical perfection but empathy.

During the interval discussion, Badura-Skoda, who will celebrate his 90th birthday in October, said that experienced musicians could pass on a rich treasure to the many younger "colleagues": "The torch must keep burning!"
 

According to the Study "Le 'poids' de l'économie créative et culturelle à Genève", 6.2% of the 320,000 economically active people in Geneva work in the cultural and creative industries (CCIs). In Zurich, the figure is 7.4% and the Swiss average is 5.4%.

Geneva has specific strengths in arts and crafts, especially in the jewelry and clothing industries. Compared to Zurich, however, music is less important in the city on the Rhone. This also applies to design, architecture and the computer games industry. In Geneva, slightly less than 10 percent of CCIs are active in the music industry, compared to around 12 percent in Zurich and around 15 percent in Switzerland as a whole.

Geneva's per capita public spending on culture of CHF 817 is the second highest in Switzerland. Only in Basel are they higher at 998 francs. In the canton of Zurich, they amount to 336 francs.

The Basel choir performed pieces by Francis Poulenc, Pavel Chesnokov and Hans Huber from Basel at the Cracovia Cantans choir competition. The jury consisted of Romuald Twardowski and Paweł Łukaszewski from Poland, Ko Matsushita from Japan, Javier Busto from Spain and Rihards Dubra from Latvia. 40 choirs from all over the world took part in the competition.

The Männerstimmen Basel was founded in 2008 by former singers of the Knabenkantorei Basel and is conducted by Oliver Rudin and David Rossel. The ensemble performs works from the Renaissance and Romantic periods, folk songs and contemporary literature. Many of the 30 singers have a background in children's and youth choirs or are currently studying music.

The meeting from June 14 to 18 at the Karlsruhe Center for Art and Media (ZKM) offers young composers a platform to present new compositional developments. Over five days, it presents a comprehensive program of concerts, lectures and installations from the fields of fixed media, spatial music and live electronics - and thus a representative overview of the current creative work of the next generation of composers.

On the afternoons and evenings of the festival, participants can look forward to a
concert program. From the second day of the festival, current developments will be discussed in lectures. All day on the forecourt of the ZKM
compositions for the sound pavilion can be heard. At the same time, numerous installations can be experienced at various locations within the ZKM.

More info: zkm.de/event/2017/06/nextgeneration-70

How the German Cultural Information Center (KIZ) writesThe Pierre Boulez Saal next to the Staatsoper Unter den Linden, which was built according to plans by architect Frank Gehry, is to become the heart of the center.

As a model for the meeting center, Barenboim is thinking "of the conference for Arabic music, in which European composers such as Béla Bártok and Paul Hindemith also took part in Cairo in 1932," writes the KIZ. In the coming season, musicians from the Middle East and Asia will perform alongside chamber music ensembles.

With its elliptical shape and flexible stage set-up, the new concert hall offers a wide range of design options and space for around 700 visitors. Japanese acoustician Yasuhisa Toyota, known for his expertise, is responsible for the hall's acoustics. Both Frank Gehry and Yasuhisa Toyota have generously donated their work to the Barenboim-Said Academy and waived their fees.

The more than 80 participating orchestras come from 12 different countries, including Japan, China, the Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Bulgaria, Hungary and Switzerland. The orchestras compete in the categories of concert, parade music, show, percussion and big band. They will be judged by experts from Canada, Germany, Austria, Belgium and Switzerland.

On 6 July 2017, the National Youth Wind Orchestra and the Symphonic Wind Orchestra of the Swiss Armed Forces will showcase the level of music-making in Switzerland in Theater 11. To kick off the festival weekend, around 3,700 participating young people will march into the Hallenstadion with their national flags on Friday evening, July 7, 2017. On Saturday morning, July 8, 2017, more than 80 youth orchestras from all over the world will parade through Zurich's Old Town.

The central festival site is the Münsterhof, where there is a Chilbi throughout the weekend. The free "Young talents on stage" concerts by international youth orchestras will also take place here and in many other places in the city. The festival ends on Sunday afternoon, July 9, 2017, in the Hallenstadion with the closing ceremony, including the eagerly awaited award ceremony.

Around 400 volunteers make it possible to stage this major event, which first brought together musicians aged between 9 and 25 in 1985. Over the past 30 years, 170 orchestras from 40 countries have met for a musical competition.

Info: www.wjmf.ch
 

The Schnellertollermeier trio (Andreas Schnellmann, Manuel Troller, David Meier) received funding of CHF 30,000 for their project "Rights" in September 2017. Pink Spider (Valerie Koloszar and Daniel Wehrlin) for "Shakery Bakery", which is to be realized in March 2018, 20,000 francs.

The Canton of Lucerne supports "proven creative artists through regular calls for proposals for selective funding". Work grants are awarded in the fields of fine and applied arts, while selective production grants are awarded in the other fields.

The music jury consists of Sascha Armbruster (musician, lecturer HSLU Music, Allschwil), Thomas Gisler (Lucerne), Franziska Schläpfer (musician, Zurich), Fabienne Schmuki (Managing Director Irascible Music, Zurich) and Anna Balbi (Head of Cultural Promotion Canton Lucerne).

The Lucerne Symphony Orchestra will be the main user of the building. It will also be used by other institutions from Lucerne's musical life. Talks are already underway with the "Blasorchester Stadtmusik Luzern".

In addition to the existing music school and the Südpol cultural center, the new music academy will also be built on the Südpol site in the near future. Together with the premises of the Lucerne Theater housed there, this will create an entire music campus.

According to the orchestra's press release, the building will be largely financed by private donors. The Lucerne Symphony Orchestra Foundation undertakes to cover part of the operating costs. The remainder of the operating costs will be financed through rentals to the Lucerne Symphony Orchestra Association and other users.

An architectural competition was held for the building in December 2016. The orchestra intends to communicate about this if the feasibility of the project is realistic. The construction project is to be worked out in detail by fall 2017 and the building application is to be submitted by the end of 2017. Construction is scheduled to begin in spring 2018 and is expected to take around one year.

The idea for the project came from Swiss child psychiatrist Heinz Stefan Hertzka and wind musician Sandro Friedrich. At the Gypsy Festival, Christian Fotsch came into contact with children from the Children Beyond choir. Together with Tina Turner, Regula Curti from Erlenbach and Dechen Shak-Dagsay from Saturday, they had recorded a CD with sung prayers and mantras from various religions.

The 30 children and young people have been practising once a week in five groups. On Saturday, July 1, they will show what they have learned together with their leaders in Zurich. Each group has dedicated itself to music and, in some cases, dance from a particular culture: Spanish, Swiss, Alevi, African and Balkan. They met up several times to make music and dance together - even crossing cultural boundaries.

"Many immigrant children fall between a rock and a hard place culturally," explains project manager Christian Fotsch, "they don't have access to the culture of their home country, but they don't really have access to that of Switzerland either." The project aims to give the 7 to 16-year-olds this access, have an integrative effect and at the same time promote exchange. "In the Spanish group, for example, it's not just Spanish children who make music," says Fotsch. However, certain instruments are predetermined: In the Spanish group, the flamenco guitar must be present, in the Swiss group the accordion.

The costs for "Beyond Cultures" are borne by Beat and Regula Curti's Beyond Fondation in Erlenbach, and the children can attend the classes free of charge. The five groups are currently rehearsing in Zurich, Olten, Geneva, Bern and Windisch.

More info: www.beyondcultures.ch

Applications for the scholarship were accepted until April 13 (SMZ has reported). The jury chose Stefan Keller, who was born in Zurich in 1974.

According to the foundation, Stefan Keller will be living and composing at the Schoeck Villa in Brunn from August 20 to September 17. He will compose a song with piano or orchestral accompaniment. Interested parties can come into contact with the artist in several short events, framed by an opening evening and a closing event.

According to the Jena Philharmonic Orchestra, Gaudenz won out against well over 100 competitors. He convinced "the Jena musicians with his professional qualities, his musical ideas and concepts as well as his charisma as a person and artist". In the coming season, he will already be conducting six concerts in Jena

Simon Gaudenz has been Chief Conductor of the Hamburg Camerata chamber orchestra since 2012 and Principal Guest Conductor of the Odense Symphony Orchestra since 2010. From 2004 to 2011 he was Artistic Director and Principal Conductor of the Collegium Musicum Basel. Before that, he conducted the camerata variabile basel for four years.

The Jena Philharmonic Orchestra is the largest concert orchestra in Thuringia and the only one with three associated choirs, the Philharmonic Choir, the Jena Madrigal Circle and the Boys' Choir. It was founded in 1934 as the municipal symphony orchestra on the occasion of the city's 700th anniversary celebrations and has been a permanent fixture in the cultural life of the city and state ever since.
 

As part of several studies, the Zurich researchers are using electroencephalography (EEG) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to investigate whether and to what extent people with absolute hearing and/or sound-color synesthesia use the same structural and functional networks in the brain for basic auditory processes - for example, hearing individual sounds or entire pieces of music - as people without these abilities.

Participation will be remunerated. All further information can be found on the website www.musikundgehirn.ch to find.
 

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart composed the piano variations Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman K 300e (265) in 1778 as a Ariette avec variations pour le clavecin ou Pianoforte on the occasion of a concert tour to Paris. From well-known Mozart operas such as The Magic Flute, Don Giovanni and The Marriage of Figaro arrangements for two flutes were already being made around 1800. It is therefore obvious that these well-known piano variations should also be arranged for this instrumentation. This arrangement by Peter Kolman endeavors to remain largely true to the original and finds elegant solutions to reduce the mostly polyphonic piano part.

In theme and variation 1, the parts are divided between the first and second flutes. Variation 3 takes the outer parts and omits the middle parts. In variation 6, the editor has dispensed with the chordal realization in the right hand and octaved the left hand. In the 7th variation, the piano parts have been taken over. The minor variation 8 and variation 9 are set much less densely than in the original. However, there are also passages in variations 10 and 12 which are octavated in such a way that the upper voice reaches the four-note a and c, which is atypical for Mozart's flute compositions and could possibly have been solved in a more stylistically appropriate way. The Adagio, Variation 11, sounds extremely attractive with the cantabile melody in the first flute.

Peter Kolman recommends swapping the parts in each variation, especially if both players have the same technical skills. All in all, the arrangement can certainly be compared with other duet arrangements of well-known works by Mozart and is an enrichment of the duet literature for flute.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Variations on the French song "Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman" for 2 flutes KV 300e (265), arranged for 2 flutes by Peter Kolman, UE 17297, € 11.95, Universal Edition, Vienna 2016

Over four days, discussions took place in panels, votes were cast in forums and networking meetings were held. Showcases brought new music projects from classical, indie, crossover and other music fields to the stage and to the agencies.
What is the future viability of the sector? Which trends should we not miss out on? How can the audience of tomorrow and the day after tomorrow be identified, addressed and involved? Is streaming all the rage? Is there a future for music journalism? How diverse is the music sector in reality? What funding opportunities are there for European cooperation projects? These and many other topics were discussed by the participants.

The Swiss music scene was represented at the joint stand of the Fondation Suisa, an opportunity that could be used to a much greater extent, as the conditions are comparatively low and the support is extremely professional and friendly.

As in previous years, the vocal scene was again underrepresented, both in terms of promoters and the music projects presented. This is all the more surprising given that the vocal and choral music-making sector is a growth market. Nevertheless, a workshop was co-organized by the Tenso network (The European network for professional chamber choirs) ("Connecting People - Choral Music and More"), at which the remarkable vote was made: "Choral music is the symphony of the 21st century."

The next edition of the industry get-together will take place in Rotterdam from May 16 to 19, 2018.