A "Schwyz booklet" published by the Schwyz Cantonal Culture Commission on the history of folk music in the inner part of the canton has met with a surprisingly high level of interest. The canton has now reprinted it.
Music newspaper editorial office
(translation: AI)
- 21 Jun 2016
Muotathal musicians (see below). Photo: Bert Schnüriger, Seewen
The booklet on the origins and history of Central Swiss country music, which was printed in an edition of 900 copies, was completely sold out within three weeks, according to a statement from the canton. A second edition has now been published and is available again with immediate effect.
Instrumental folk music has always played an important role in the canton of Schwyz, especially in the inner part of the canton. Numerous musicians known throughout Switzerland come from this region. In addition to well-known names such as Kasi Geisser, Piitschä-Wysel, Toni Bürgler and others, numerous other musicians have played for dancing and entertainment in the Schwyz villages from Küssnacht to Goldau, in the Schwyz valley basin, Muotathal, Illgau, Gersau, but also in the mountain region of Sattel and Rothenthurm over the last 100 years or so, whose names are known only to a few today. The new 204-page booklet is dedicated to all these well-known and unknown folk musicians.
Available is the Schwyz magazine from the Cantonal Cultural Commission Schwyz at a price of CHF 25 plus postage and packaging. Available during office hours on 041 819 20 88 or by e-mail kulturfoerderung.afk@sz.ch.
Photo above (from left): Franz Föhn senior, Franz Schmidig junior, Franz Schmidig senior and Franz Föhn junior.
SRF2 Kultur merges jazz and world music formats
SRF2 Kultur is cutting back on special-interest programs: In future, "Klangfenster" will only be available at weekends. "Parlando" as an independent program will be dropped completely. According to the broadcaster, this is in response to "the public's desire for more music".
Music newspaper editorial office
(translation: AI)
- 20 Jun 2016
According to the official announcement by the public broadcaster, the music topics of "Parlando" will be integrated into the programs "Kontext" and "Passagen" from July 4, 2016. "Jazz aktuell" and "Musik der Welt" will be merged into the new format "Jazz & World aktuell". In-depth topics of these two music genres will also be covered in "Kontext" and "Passage" in future.
The afternoon program on SRF2 Kultur from Monday to Friday will in future be devoted entirely to classical music, the station writes. The "Klassiktelefon" and "Concerto" will be followed by a light classical program until 4 pm. The "Klangfenster" will continue to be broadcast on Saturdays and now Sundays, while the weekday broadcasts will be discontinued.
The evening will become even more music-heavy after the 10 p.m. news: the previous genres from early music to jazz will remain, but the proportion of music will be increased. The concert broadcasts will remain unchanged. The flagship programs "Diskothek", "Jazz Collection" and "Musik unserer Zeit" are excluded from the changes.
As the broadcaster quotes its program director Barbara Gysi, it is "striving for a clearer program structure with these changes". The adjusted program structure also makes it possible to "broadcast the most popular programs as repeats."
Helvetic fire in Meiningen
The Swiss Philippe Bach has been General Music Director of the historic Hofkapelle since 2010. In his programs, he builds bridges from one country to another with many Swiss performers and works.
Hanspeter Renggli
(translation: AI)
- 20 Jun 2016
Philippe Bach in Meiningen. Photo: Michael Reichel
From Bach to Bach. This is a brief description of the history of the 325-year-old Meiningen court orchestra. It was Johann Ludwig Bach, a distant relative of the great J. S., who, followed by other members of the widely ramified family, transformed the royal seat of Saxony-Meiningen into an important musical center with the court orchestra in the first third of the 18th century. For six years now, a completely different Bach, namely a Swiss Bach, has been at the helm of Meiningen's musical culture as General Music Director: Philippe Bach, who studied horn and conducting in Bern, Geneva, Zurich and Manchester, took over one of the most historic German orchestras in 2010.
Proud history
Meiningen is a quiet and pretty small town in southern Thuringia between the Rhön and the Thuringian Forest, which has been spared to some extent from the hardships of recent German history. However, Meiningen is also a unique cultural center. First of all, there is the court orchestra, a symphony orchestra with a good sixty members, whose meteoric rise before and around 1900 is associated with names such as Franz Liszt, Johannes Brahms, Hans von Bülow, Richard Strauss and Max Reger or that of the violinist Alexander Ritter and the clarinettist Richard Mühlfeld. It was the Meiningen court orchestra that shaped the Bayreuth Festival Orchestra for years, not only because of its proximity but also because of its outstanding qualities.
There is the Meininger Theater, where - also at the end of the 19th century and probably for the first time in history - an early form of director's theater and a consistently naturalistic directorial and visual concept was developed, which made history under the heading "Meininger Principles". For years, the Meininger Theater toured Europe on the newly built railroad lines, always carrying the detailed and voluminous stage sets of the Coburg theater painter Max Brückner in up to 20 railroad carriages. No wonder the people of Meiningen still revere Duke Georg II like a city father. From 1866, the so-called "Theatre Duke" had not only supported the orchestra and theater for over half a century, he had also directed and sketched stage props, and last but not least, as a socially liberal-minded politician, he stood up to the Wilhelmine Empire.
Today, there are also the Kammerspiele, which focuses on experimental plays, the puppet theater or the cabaret and dance houses ... Meiningen is an extraordinary city of art and, with its 20,000 inhabitants, only half the size of Thun or Aarau.
Courageous presence
If you click on Meiningen's official website, the first thing you see is the golden vault of the theater, an empire-style building. Philippe Bach comes and goes here, conducting concerts and operas, such as Straussʼ Capriccio or Adèsʼ Powder Her Face. Unless the General Music Director (GMD) is on the road with his court orchestra, for example in the steam locomotive works in the north of the city or again and again in the great hall at Wartburg Castle near Eisenach, where Wagner's Tannhäuser is played at the "original location", so to speak - a special kind of tourist event.
2015/16 was an anniversary year for the Meininger Hofkapelle, which also performs the orchestral concerts in the theater. The orchestra, which has borne its old name again since 2006, celebrated its 325th anniversary. However, to paraphrase Mahler's oft-quoted words, Philippe Bach is far from worshipping the ashes of past weddings, but has lit several fires since taking office, Helvetic ones nota bene. Of course, Brahms, Strauss and Reger may enjoy a certain privileged position, but an interpreter who has honed his craft with personalities such as Peter Eötvös knows the present and looks to the future. The fact that a kind of Swiss constant enriches his programs is gratifying and, above all, not to be taken for granted.
Fruitful exchange
From the very beginning, Philippe Bach regularly invited Swiss performers such as the pianist Adrian Oetiker, the horn player Olivier Darbellay and the conductor Kaspar Zehnder to Meiningen. Compositions by Honegger, Martin or Rudolf Moser have probably been internalized by the Meiningen audience in a way that one can only dream of here in Switzerland. So it is hardly surprising that Bach did not hold back from inviting two Swiss performers, Heinz Holliger and Mario Venzago, for the anniversary season. Framed by early works by Richard Strauss, Holliger presented five of his solo and duo compositions with the klangart ensemble to the enthusiastic Thuringian audience. This resulted in a multi-perspective Meiningen-Swiss program.
Concert programs speak a special language when the pieces look at each other, complement each other and point beyond themselves in their constellation. Mario Venzago dared to combine Arthur Honegger's Fifth (di tre re) and Paul Juon's A major Symphony was even a purely Swiss program. Juon's symphony, which earned the composer the honorific title of a "Russian Brahms" during his lifetime, was premiered by the Meiningen court orchestra in 1903. In the coming season, Philippe Bach will once again present an astonishing Swiss guest package in Meiningen with bassoonist Andrea Cellacchi, pianists Adrian Oetiker and Teo Gheorgiu and flautist Matthias Ziegler. In return, Philippe Bach will conduct Max Reger's Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Mozart, a work that the composer wrote in Meiningen in 1914, at the Bern Symphony Orchestra concert in November.
A very special musical axis has emerged between republican-helvetic restraint and courtly Thuringian historicity.
Children's concert with Philippe Bach in Meiningen. Photo: Michael Reichel
The Tschumi Prize goes to Michael Buchanan
Two soloists and three soloists successfully completed their Master of Arts in Specialized Music Performance, the highest level of Swiss classical music education, last Friday at the soloist concert Michael Buchanan was awarded the Eduard Tschumi Prize 2016 for the best soloist examination.
Music newspaper editorial office
(translation: AI)
- 19 Jun 2016
Michael Buchanan. Photo: zVg
Every year, students at Bern University of the Arts (HKB) who are completing their Master of Arts in Specialized Music Performance Classical Music perform at the soloist concert at the Kultur Casino Bern. Following the concert, the Eduard Tschumi Prize is awarded to the soloist with the best overall score of the entire three-part Master's examination. On June 17, the prize, worth CHF 12,000, went to trombonist Michael Buchanan.
The English trombonist Michael Buchanan, a student of Ian Bousfield, has already gained experience as an orchestral musician with numerous orchestras, including the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, the Vienna State Opera, the Philharmonia Orchestra London and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. Michael Buchanan was awarded first prize and the audience prize at the 64th ARD International Music Competition in 2015. In the 2015/16 and 16/17 seasons, he performed as a soloist with the Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra of the SWR, the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin and the Orkiestra Aukso in Poland.
Angélique Boudeville (voice), Lucas Perez Bruno (oboe), Laura Schmid (recorder) and Dmitry Serebrennikov (violin) have also successfully completed their Master's degree in Specialized Music Performance Classical Music The soloist concerts were accompanied by the Bern Symphony Orchestra under the direction of conductor Ekkehard Klemm.
Germany lowers artists' social security contribution rate
At the beginning of next year, the rate of the artists' social security contribution in Germany is to be reduced from 5.2% to 4.8%. This would reduce the burden on artists and companies liable to pay contributions.
Music newspaper editorial office
(translation: AI)
- 17. Jun 2016
Photo: sigrid rossmann/pixelio.de
Many musicians are among the freelance artists. According to the German Orchestra Association (DOV), increasing digitalization alone has meant that parts of their income from the management of ancillary copyrights have so far been lost without replacement. Under these circumstances, their social security is more important than ever. This also applies with regard to avoiding poverty in old age.
More than 180,000 freelance artists are compulsorily insured under the German artists' social insurance scheme (which has no direct equivalent in Switzerland), including more than 51,000 in the music sector. This means that, despite being self-employed, they enjoy the protection of statutory health, long-term care and pension insurance.
Like other compulsorily insured employees, insured persons pay half of their contributions. The other half is paid by the federal government (20 percent) and companies that award contracts to freelance artists and publicists (30 percent). The artists' social security contribution is levied as a levy. The levy rate is set annually for the following calendar year. The assessment basis is the fees paid in the previous year.
Many thresholds crossed
Daniel Ott and Manos Tsangaris led the Munich Biennale for New Music Theater into a new era with verve. In symposia and performances, they set a number of Swiss accents and coined a new term for music theater with "OmU".
A pedestrian zone in the center of Munich. Two passers-by are bending attentively over a garbage can. Is there something to watch, hear or smell? Others walk past carelessly, others join them, while the first ones move away without exchanging words.
The video documentation as an integral part of the piece Staring at the Bin ("Anmülleimer anstarren", composition and concept Meriel Price) is symptomatic of a concept of music theater that Munich Biennale (May 28 to June 9, 2016) under the new directorship of composer duo Daniel Ott and Manos Tsangaris. The focus is on integrating the city and everyday life as well as opening up to interaction, strange occurrences and altered sound perception. According to the two artistic directors, "threshold crossers" are to be attracted and the Biennale opened up with performative sound interventions in the urban space, the consolidation of the festival and a doubling of the number of world premieres to 15 in 13 days. By including individual new venues away from the major venues, the team of artistic directors deliberately deviated from the programs of their predecessors Hans-Werner Henze and Peter Ruzicka.
Ott and Tsangaris seem to complement each other perfectly, as Daniel Ott, a Swiss national anchored in his adopted home of Berlin, brings with him many years of experience as director of the Rümlingen Festival for New Music, which specializes in musical dialogue with the environment (see interview in the Swiss Music Newspaper 6/2016, p. 6 ff.). Since his first music theater miniatures in the 1970s, Tsangaris, who teaches in Dresden, has devoted himself to radical statements on world references, new parameters of theatrical actions, the search for sounds and encounters with the audience.
The radical break with Munich tradition is nevertheless surprising and testifies to a genuine passion for the cause. The choice of the biennial title OmU - Original with subtitlesThe "film", which in the cinema is the decisive indicator for an unadulterated screening, is deliberately based on cinematic processes. He evokes numerous possibilities of how an original can be related to its transposition or realization, but also fragmentation, alienation or documentation. At the same time, he alludes to the "OmÜ" variant - original with surtitles - of common practice in opera.
Symposium with Swiss accents
What does the term "original" mean and what do new formats and strategies look like in today's music theater? Is the term "music theater" still appropriate at all and what relationship could this music theater have to other fields of contemporary art?
With a view to productions of the Biennale, but also on the basis of fundamental and further-reaching considerations, a dense symposium conceived by Jörn Peter Hiekel (Dresden/Zurich) and David Roesner (Munich) under the title OmU - Echo spaces and search movements in today's music theater to the discourse. The fact that Switzerland is evidently a fertile breeding ground for the musical-theatrical treatment of templates of all kinds was particularly evident at this event.
The two artistic directors playfully introduced the themes of originality, authorship and hierarchies, before subtitling and encouraging each other with "keep talking" and "keep playing" on instruments in a flowing transition between word and sound - Ott on the piano prepared with blind rivets and Tsangaris on the forest devil and flummi ball.
Roman Brotbeck (Bern/Basel) showed a way of dealing with the original by setting Robert Walser's texts to music. Only in the last twenty years has Walser often been set to music, especially in théâtre musical, which Brotbeck justified with an interest in biographical topoi. He exemplified the relationship between the style of Walser's texts and the methods of théâtre musical with works by Mischa Käser, Georges Aperghis, Helmut Oehring, Johannes Harneit, Ruedi Häusermann and Heinz Holliger.
David Roesner (Munich) presented Christoph Marthaler's The Unanswered Question (Basel 1997) as a key work for dealing with models. It uses Charles Ivesʼ epochal piece of the same name (1908), which addresses fundamental questions of music. Ruedi Häusermann's music theater A multitude of quiet whistles (Zurich 2011), which led to a staged concert in the box after a musicalized walk through the workshops of Zurich's Schiffbau, was read by Leo Dick (Bern) as a "composed memory work" (see Dick's article of the same name in: Transitions: New music theater - vocal art - staged musicStuttgarter Musikwissenschaftliche Schriften 4, edited by Andreas Meyer and Christina Richter-Ibáñez, Mainz 2016).
Phone Call to Hades. Photo: Munich Biennale, Franz Kimmel
Platforms and collaborations
The new Munich Biennale sees itself to a not inconsiderable extent as a forum for young artists. At international platforms, which initially took place in Munich in 2013 and later with partners in Bern, Rotterdam, Buenos Aires and Beijing, new teams were formed with selected young artists and new ways of working together were sought. The result was a variety of collaborative projects and formats, examples of which are presented here with the participation of Swiss artists.
In Phone Call to Hades with music by Zurich-based composer Cathy van Eck (Isabelle Kranabetter, dramaturgy; Blanka Radoczy, direction; Claudia Irro, costume) focused on the human voice. In a somewhat spooky, guided tour along secluded Isar meadows at a late night (and rainy) hour, the audience followed the paths of three classically trained singers. While their costumes evoked myths and legends, they first scurried through sections of forest, only to meet later in bizarre musical dialog miniatures in which bird-like vocal motifs, technical transformation and recorded voice samples intertwined. While the piece alludes to the uncertain localization of voices between this world and the hereafter, which was triggered by the phonograph in the 19th century, the boundaries between original and alienation actually became increasingly blurred, intensified by the visual ambiguity in the darkness of the night.
An hour-long sounding walk through seven nested underground rooms could be experienced in Mnemo/scene: Echoes (Stephanie Haensler, composition; Pauline Beaulieu, direction; Ariel Farace, text; Yvonne Leinfelder, stage). Memorable installations, reminiscent of arte povera (piles of pebbles, ephemeral sand writings), fragments of Dubuffet's figures or futuristic buildings, were interwoven with musical miniatures (as pre-memory fragments), sounded with text fragments or set in motion by a dancer. If the musicians and performers moved according to an unclear scheme, the audience decided for themselves where they wanted to be. Approximately in the middle of the piece, all participants gathered for a twenty-minute concert situation. While the reminiscence of a piano piece (op. 28/2) by Robert Schumann resounded in the music of the Swiss composer Stephanie Hänsler, an individual perception and later memory condensed in each of those present.
One step further in dealing with the original The Navidson Records - a music theater as an installationunder the artistic direction of Tassilo Tesche and Till Wyler von Ballmoos (Ole Hübner, Rosalba Quindici, Benedikt Schiefer: composition; Kristian Hverring: sound design). The six-hour performance took place in an intricate labyrinth with spherical sounds, lighting moods and self-observing video installations. The audience, who could stay as long as they wanted, were involved in the action right from the start. Divided into small groups, the audience had to find the entrance themselves - and smash a wall behind which cherub performers dressed in sand-colored baroque underwear fled in all directions, shrieking in reaction to the intruders.
While all the performers carried out Dadaistically repetitive actions (for example, Wyler von Ballmoos strummed the piano seemingly at random from time to time, partitions were constantly being pulled up and down or Leo Dick held a fictitious interview), the audience was asked to help themselves to drinks, take part in a puzzle or an oversized pink stuffed rabbit looked over their shoulders. The immersion in a disconcerting (nightmare) dream world was combined with a character of the unfinished and blurred reality and fiction. As a co-production with the Bern University of the Arts, the play will be performed again in Bern.
The Navidson Records. Photo: Munich Biennale, Franz Kimmel
Cinema in the head
In the double evening Sez Ner and Pub - Advertisements one actor or actress translated an original into an imaginary music theater in miniature format: Arno Camenisch impressed as a performer of his debut novel written in Rhaeto-Romanic and German Sez Ner with his noisy, melodious power of speech, which he performed in a fusion of gestures, facial expressions and body language, while Donatienne Michel-Dansac in George Aperghis' new piece Pub - Advertisements seduced the audience with her finely chiseled, mischievous performance. Camenisch's bizarre texts, brimming with black humor and depicting the harsh life in the Swiss mountains, were placed in front of the absurdities of the desires of an elegant urban consumer society, resulting in a highly amusing, yet thought-provoking panorama of today's living environments. A multi-layered fabric was created between notated original, visually powerful interpretation and imaginative cinema in the mind.
The evening, which was characterized by concentration, complexity, reduction, humour and lightness (especially as it was held on a classic peep-box stage in the Gasteig), turned out to be a very different kind of highlight within the festival. And with this production featuring just two people, the team of artistic directors, with a twinkle in their eye, defied the idea of confining contemporary music theater to a specific format.
What remains of OmU?
What most of the productions shown at the Biennale have in common is their experimental character, which includes the complete merging of levels and the overcoming of hierarchies of the participating authors and "disciplines", and in some cases also approaches to involving the audience.
Ott/Tsangaris' new biennial concept seemed to work, at least as far as the audience was concerned, as many of the performances were completely sold out, even in the unusual venues. The "threshold crossers" were there, and they were curious and communicative.
Looking back, the initially somewhat surprising motto OmU even as central to today's music and art creation per se. The view of our reality as well as the perception of productions have changed into a network of further subtitles, surtitles, fragments, quotations, notations ...
Zurich city talers for Weibel and Weingarten
Peter F. Weibel and Elmar Weingarten were presented with the "Stadttaler", the City of Zurich's medal of honor, by Corinne Mauch in recognition of their great commitment to the Zurich Festival.
Music newspaper editorial office
(translation: AI)
- 17. Jun 2016
Elmar Weingarten at the Dada Soiree I of this year's festival. Photo: Markus Bauer
The mayor presented the award during a Dada poetry slam evening at the Schauspielhaus Zurich. With the awarding of the Medal of Honor of the City of Zurich, the city and canton, represented by Government Councillor Jacqueline Fehr, thanked the two for their many years of significant commitment to the cultural city of Zurich: Elmar Weingarten was artistic director of the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich from 2007 to 2014 and has been managing director and artistic director of the Zurich Festival since 2011. Peter F. Weibel has been President of the Zurich Festival Foundation since 2003.
With the current edition of the festival, Elmar Weingarten and Peter F. Weibel are ending their work for the festival, which is jointly supported by Zurich's cultural institutions and whose development they have shaped over the years. The 2016 Zurich Festival, entitled "Dada - Between Madness and Nonsense", will run until June 26.
Basel's orchestra funding takes shape
On the recommendation of an international jury of experts, the government council of the Canton of Basel-Stadt has for the first time awarded contributions from the orchestra program funding. Four out of eight applications were approved.
Music newspaper editorial office
(translation: AI)
- 16 Jun 2016
Basel Chamber Orchestra. Photo: Heike Kandalowski
The Cantonal Department of Culture has developed a concept for a new orchestra funding policy, which came into force with the decision of the Grand Council on December 16, 2015. It now provides for multi-year program funding for professional Basel orchestras and larger instrumental ensembles as well as structural funding. CHF 5,576,000 is available for this purpose for the years 2016 to 2019. The year 2016 will be used as a bridging year and the existing state contributions totaling CHF 1,094,000 will be extended by one year.
For the 2017-2019 funding period, the following orchestras and instrumental ensembles will receive a multi-year grant totaling CHF 4,035,000 from the Orchestra programme funding:
The jury consisted of Valerio Benz (SRF2 Kultur), Michael Breugst (WDR 3), Christine Lemke-Matwey (DIE ZEIT), Roman Brotbeck, Björn Gottstein (Artistic Director of the Donaueschinger Musiktage), Regula Rapp (Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst Stuttgart) and Alexander Steinbeis (Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin), as well as ex officio representatives of the authorities Caroline Specht and Philippe Bischof.
Prize for contemporary music journalism
SRF cultural journalist Theresa Beyer has been awarded the Reinhard Schulz Prize for Contemporary Music Journalism 2016. The critics' prize is awarded during the Darmstadt Summer Course.
Music newspaper editorial office
(translation: AI)
- 15 Jun 2016
Matthias Willi/SRF
Theresa Beyer
Theresa Beyer was born in Leipzig in 1986, now lives in Bern and has been working as a music and culture journalist for Swiss radio SRF 2 Kultur since 2014. The trained musicologist also works for the Bern-based Network for Local and Global Sounds and Media Culture, Norient, and is a freelance music author and curator.
The jury - consisting of Lydia Jeschke (SWR / D), Christine Lemke-Matwey (DIE ZEIT / D), Elisabeth Schwind (Südkurier / D), Stefan Fricke (Hessischer Rundfunk / D) and Peter Hagmann (Neue Zürcher Zeitung / CH / jury chair) - was particularly impressed by the contributions Theresa Beyer created for the program "Musik unserer Zeit" on SRF 2 at its meeting on June 8, 2016.
Angela Fiore honored with the Handschin Prize 2016
The Swiss Music Research Society (SMG) is awarding Angela Fiore the 2016 Handschin Prize, endowed with CHF 10,000. The musicologist received her doctorate from the University of Fribourg with her thesis "Musica nelle istituzioni religiose femminili a Napoli 1650-1750".
Music newspaper editorial office
(translation: AI)
- 14 Jun 2016
Angela Fiore (Photo: SMG),SMPV
According to the reviewer, Angela Fiore's work expands our knowledge of the role of music in cultural practices in Naples at the time of absolutism.
The prizewinner is a violinist and musicologist. She completed her violin studies in Cremona (Civica Scuola di Musica). She studied musicology at the University of Pavia (Cremona) and worked on a research project for the Pergolesi Spontini Foundation (Jesi). Her research focuses on Baroque ecclesiastical music in Naples.
The Jacques Handschin Prize, awarded for the fourth time, is named after the Moscow-born Swiss musicologist and organist Jacques Handschin (1886-1955). It is awarded every two years. This year, a total of ten recent doctoral graduates from Basel, Bern, Fribourg, Geneva, Lucerne, Zurich and Leicester (UK) have applied for the prize.
Alternative to tropical wood in instrument making
Robert König is Professor of Musical Instrument Making Technology at the West Saxon University of Applied Sciences Zwickau (WHZ). He has been awarded the environmental prize of the Chemnitz Chamber of Crafts for a new combination of materials for the production of fingerboards for stringed instruments.
Music newspaper editorial office
(translation: AI)
- 13 Jun 2016
Robert König (Image: West Saxon University of Applied Sciences Zwickau)
The newly developed fingerboard material is made from recycled paper, spruce and natural resins. According to the WHZ press release, the project, which was awarded a prize by the Chemnitz Chamber of Crafts, represents "a substantial contribution to the ecological qualification of traditional instrument making".
Rare tropical woods, especially ebony, are to be replaced by using modern substitute materials. Important varieties of ebony are currently no longer allowed to be traded without a certificate. Exports to the USA in particular are subject to very strict rules. Another aspect of the research work was the question of compensation options for natural fluctuations in the material properties of woods.
"Can you use this for life?"
On May 27, Brigitta Luisa Merki's student performance "leise brüllen" (roar quietly) with dance, music and video was a hit in the Königsfelden monastery church.
Verena Naegele
(translation: AI)
- 10 Jun 2016
Photo: Alex Spichale
Everything had to be ready to the point when 120 children and young people from the schools in Windisch had to shout quietly in front of several hundred spectators. After babel.everywhere Brigitta Luisa Merki, the director of the Tanz & Kunst Königsfelden festival, realized her second educational project with the Neuenhof school near Baden in 2014; an ambitious one at that, as the younger pupils, i.e. primary school pupils in the 5th and 6th grades, and the school leavers, the 4th secondary and high school pupils, created this unique performance together.
After four months of work in individual, strenuous workshops led by professionals, the final week of rehearsals was dedicated to putting it all together and fine-tuning it, three days in the gym and finally in the unique ambience of the monastery church. Merki crosses boundaries with her projects by bringing together artists from different fields. This year's 90-minute performance was characterized by music (rapper Big Zis and percussionist Gilson de Assis), dance (Patrick Grigo), visual design (Jacqueline Weiss), animated film (Anka Schmid), video projection (Ursula Palla) and visual art (Roman Sonderegger). Merki was responsible for the overall dramaturgy.
Anger, joie de vivre, frustration
What the artists created together with the pupils amazed, delighted and touched in equal measure. It was amazing how the teachers involved grasped the young actors' very own world and drew out their feelings. The title roar softly stands for an inner anger that wants to break out loudly, but is only expressed quietly. Soul turmoil, joie de vivre or frustration were addressed and expressed with artistic means.
Rapper Big Zis compiled statements from the pupils and used them to create a new song: "Wänns da ine brüllt, ghörsch dusse fascht nüt ... brüll liislig vo ine gäg usse ... brüll liislig vo usse gäg ine." She sang this after a funny cartoon intro with two wooden puppets that suggested the feeling of being controlled by others. The entire storyline was based on such associative images, partly represented by video sequences, which cleverly divided up the performance, and partly by hip-hop and body percussion performances by the many actors.
The standard was high, requiring rhythmic confidence, concentration, interaction, acrobatics and dance. "In the beginning, it took a lot of persuasion to motivate the young people," said Merki in her opening speech. According to Merki, the younger ones were quick to get excited, but the school leavers sometimes had their heads in a completely different place: "Why should I do this, can I use it for life?" was a frequently asked question.
In the final rehearsals, such questions of meaning became superfluous, as the participants could feel the "drive" that gripped everyone. Many parents attested to Merki that their child had grown beyond themselves, gained self-confidence and showed new sides in dealing with others. No wonder, one thinks, after experiencing the entertaining, varied and touching evening.
Photo: Alex Spichale
Percussion, light, sound
There were two girls, for example, who performed tricks on a bike to the music, or various percussion groups who, fired up by Gilson de Assis, developed a sound that "swept" with their concentrated performances on cleaning buckets and banging empty pet bottles. Or Big Zis, who evocatively chanted "Laa mich inne" while the children danced expressive choreographies. Particularly successful were the mixed numbers between the younger and older children and the performance with brightly colored cups, which produced a high intensity of light and sound when struck on the floor in different rhythmic sequences.
"Dance and rhythm allow for strong expression and inner form," Merki noted. Artist Roman Sonderegger worked with the children to create an artistic paper relief for the back wall of the stage, which provided an atmospheric setting and left plenty of room for development. The music was mainly represented by rhythm sections and electronics; instrumental music was left out for once.
The result was a total work of art that could be seen and heard. The young people realized how much strength and perseverance it takes to roar softly works. The choreographies were rehearsed again and again under the direction of world hip-hop champion Patrick Grigo, first in class and then in their free time. The effort was worth it, the audience was enthusiastic and after the performance you could hear the young people screaming, laughing and - yes - shouting loudly from the backstage.
How does science deal with social issues? How do artists deal with them? A rich supporting program for the Manifesta exhibition "Transactions" at the University of Zurich explores such questions with concerts, among other things.
Music newspaper editorial office
(translation: AI)
- 09 Jun 2016
Fritz Hauser (right) and sound engineer Patrick Becker examine loud noises. Photo: UZH/Caspar Türler,SMPV
The walk-in installation "Sound of Science" by Basel sound artist Fritz Hauser, created especially for the exhibition in the atrium, provides both quiet and louder sounds. He listened for noises in the university's laboratories and workplaces and combined them to create an ever-changing sound concert.
For "Transactions", scientists also work together with artists. This has resulted in artistic installations that arouse curiosity, provoke laughter or make you think. Together with works by internationally renowned artists such as Richard Ibghy & Marilou Lemmens, Niklas Nitschke & Vadim Zakharov or Studio Camp, transactions between artistic and scientific ways of thinking and seeing have been created.
Under the title "Er-Innerung", new and previously heard works will be performed in and around Valendas at the beginning of July.
Music newspaper editorial office
(translation: AI)
- 08 Jun 2016
Sculpture "Ogna" by Mathias Spescha,SMPV
Türälihus 2012
The ars braemia association and the Valendas Music Days are organizing seven concerts in the area in and around Valendas from 5 to 10 July under the patronage of the Valendas association. In their flyer, the organizers explain the festival motto InteriorThe aim is to "remember its roots through the performance venues. On the other hand, the revival of some pieces that have been sung in the last 10 years is intended to deepen the memory through repetition." Interior is also the title of a work for violoncello solo from 1991 by Thüring Bräm. It will be performed by Jürg Eichenberger on July 8 in the Capluta sogn Benedetg built by Peter Zumthor.
"Music fades and is transient and must therefore be recreated again and again," the organizers continue. Not only old rooms such as the Türälihus in Valendas should sound again, but also new ones, for example the Trun sculpture Ogna by Mathias Spescha, after which Thüring Bräm named his horn quartet premiered last year.
The Rectors' Conference of German Universities of Music (RKM) would like to introduce junior professorships and assistantships in the same way as for young academics at universities in order to better retain young talent.
PM/Codex flores
(translation: AI)
- 07 Jun 2016
Main building of the host University of Music Franz Liszt, Weimar. Photo: Alexander Burzik
According to the German Cultural Information Center (KIZ), Martin Ullrich, Chairman of the Rectors' Conference of German Music Universities (RKM), said after the three-day conference in Weimar that teachers could only be retained from the freelance sector through teaching assignments. However, the young professionals need secure career prospects.
Moreover, young people in their own country are increasingly at a disadvantage compared to foreign applicants for university positions. According to the KIZ report, there is no shortage of applications, but in many cases they are "unable to compete with the well-educated competition from abroad".
The profession of school musician must also become more attractive again, including with better starting conditions and better pay. It is true that state music colleges are of a high standard. However, music lessons are neglected at the schools before them. The RKM therefore suggests that university lecturers teach highly talented students in music schools.
