At the European Symposium ORGEL 2011, which took place in Zurich at the University of the Arts, Annegret Schönbeck, the initiator, reported impressively on her positive experiences during her weeks aimed at young organ players, which were financially endangered at the time. Now we have the good news:

The Stade Organ Academy invites you to the 7th Stade Youth Organ Forum this year!
It takes place from July 23 to 29, 2015 and offers young organists between the ages of 12 and 19 who have already had organ lessons (for a short time or longer) the opportunity to play together with their peers on the famous historical organs in Stade. Young people who have only had organ lessons for a short time are also welcome to take part. Information, conditions of participation and the registration form can be found at www.jugendorgelforum.de

It is also open to young people from abroad and offers daily organ lessons in small groups. The teachers are: Sibylle Groß, Martin Böcker and Annegret Schönbeck. There is an opening and closing concert, joint devotions, singing and an excursion to Cuxhaven. The costs, including accommodation in the youth hostel and meals, are modest at €250.00. International contacts between young people who can form friendships are invaluable.
 

Ten works were submitted this year, eight of which were awarded prizes. The jury consisted of Roland Moser, Alfred Zimmerlin and Droujelub Yanakiew. On March 29, the Camerata Zurich, conducted by Droujelub Yanakiew, performed the best compositions in the Great Hall of the Zurich Conservatory of Music.

The following prizes were awarded:

Category I: born between 2005 and 2003
2nd prize: Rubén Ramos, Dream of sounds
2nd prize: Gila Kilcher, Snake and giant

With the award of the Schwyz Culture Recognition Prize, endowed with 10,000 Swiss francs, the Culture Commission and Cantonal Council are honoring the Einsiedeln yodeler Nadja Räss, who "has been providing important impulses in Schwyz culture for many years with her artistic work and commitment", according to the canton's press release. She has made a name for herself as a yodeller, singing teacher/yodelling teacher and composer far beyond the canton of Schwyz.

According to the canton of Schwyz, her winning way of combining old and new music has enabled her to inspire traditional yodelling circles as well as new, more urban audiences for the traditional Swiss way of yodelling. She has also been the artistic and operational director of Klangwelt Toggenburg since 2012.

Born and raised in Küssnacht am Rigi in 1977 and now living in Lucerne, musician and sound artist Roland Bucher is a percussion teacher at the Küssnacht Music School. Among other things, he develops instruments in the field of live electronics. With his "Noise Table" he samples acoustic instruments and everyday objects. The resulting sound collages oscillate between the sounds of the acoustic source material and electronically modified "sound clouds". The prize is endowed with 5000 francs.

The museums with their top-class art collections and exhibitions have characterized the cultural city of Winterthur since the 19th century, according to the cultural mission statement. This also applies to the Musikkollegium Winterthur orchestra, which emerged from the Musikkollegium founded 250 years earlier. The music festivals are also core elements of Winterthur's cultural life.

Since the 1990s, the city has also made a name for itself with the Center for Photography, which has a national reputation. Technorama, Gewerbemuseum, Naturmuseum and other exhibition venues complement the focus on museums.

In the long-term perspective, the mission statement commits to the music festivals of various musical genres and the Musikkollegium Winterthur. The latter should retain its status as a professional orchestra.

The new cultural mission statement of the city of Winterthur can here can be downloaded.

People interested in culture from the canton of Solothurn can apply to succeed the retiring President Heinz L. Jeker-Stich. The position starts on July 1. The presidency is not an appointment, but the chairmanship of a cantonal commission.

The Executive Committee is supported operationally by an office. The expenses are compensated with attendance fees and travel expenses as well as project-oriented remuneration. The electoral authority is the Government Council.

More info: www.so.ch

The institute, which is affiliated with the Lübeck University of Music (MHL), bought the leaves at auction for 70,000 euros. The autograph was created in spring 1873 based on a text by the poet Eduard Mörike. The three-and-a-half page manuscript is a fair copy by Johannes Brahms.

Brahms took up Mörike's folk tone in his 72-bar setting. The compositional highlight of the song lies in the artful construction of the constantly changing meter from triple meter to duple meter. In. October 1873 Brahms sent Agnes together with other songs from Opus 59 to his publisher Rieter-Biedermann in Winterthur for publication and recommended them as "particularly lovely, recommendable, pleasant, only occasionally difficult, moral, God-fearing, in short 'Lieder' prima Sorte."

The Brahms-Institut is planning a detailed presentation of the new acquisition at an event in the summer semester. The date has not yet been set.

No lesser musicians and arrangers than the renowned Toni Lakatos and Edward A. Partyka have worked for the Impro book by Christian Schatka - instrumental teacher, multi-instrumentalist, author and composer - has written a recommendation. These competent references lead us to expect a convincing publication, and when browsing through it, the reader is indeed very impressed by the improvisation method for beginners, its structural design and the numerous audio examples.

Over six chapters, starting from simple playing with just a few notes, Schatka leads us through technical instructions, music theory, rhythm exercises and on to relevant key studies and chord names for swing, blues, funk and rock/pop. The target audience - ambitious amateur musicians, classically trained instrumentalists and teachers as well as self-taught musicians - is not only guided through passages of sheet music, but also through written explanations and theoretical explanations on how to get started with the exercises and master the first steps of improvisation. Of course, self-study requires discipline! But if you work through it carefully, you will be rewarded in the finale on page 109. In addition, the audio examples recorded by the studio musicians, which you can also listen to in the background for your own enjoyment, will help you to get through any dry spells.

After reviewing the new teaching material, Christian Schatka's practical lessons are of particular interest: various promising offers can be found on his website. For all those who like to acquire knowledge and skills with an individual touch in dialog with a teacher, the Impro book certainly also the right companion for instrumental lessons!

Christian Schatka, The Impro Book. Improvisation method for beginners. Bossa nova, rock, pop, swing, funk; edition for alto saxophone,
D 05 487; for tenor saxophone, D 05 488; with CD, € 25.95 each, Doblinger, Vienna 2014

Eduard Hanslick, probably the strictest music critic of his time, described Antonín Dvořák's Piano Quintet, completed in October 1887, as "one of the most fragrant new blossoms on the tree of our chamber music". In fact, the work immediately met with the undivided approval of the international audience after its premiere in Prague in January 1888. It became one of the master's most popular works and is still popular today. "There is depth, pathos, grace and power everywhere", enthused a London critic in 1888. The Dumka, reminiscent of the second movement of Schumann's Quintet, and the lively Furiant give the work its Slavic character. The outer movements are no less impressive, especially the first with its cantabile themes and their virtuoso treatment.

The new Bärenreiter edition is based on the parts of the first edition by Simrock. Parts and piano score are pleasantly large, easy to read and can be easily turned over, especially at the piano.

Antonín Dvořák, Quintet in A major op. 81 for piano, two violins, viola and violoncello, Urtext ed. Antonín Cubr, BA 9573, € 23.95, Bärenreiter, Prague 2013

The fact that the harp is hardly ever used in jazz probably has to do with the fact that musicians consider the expression of this angelic instrument to be too gentle and too limited for a genre that relies on expressivity. However, the Geneva group Orioxy, founded in 2008, shows on their new album Lost Children even more clearly than on its two predecessors how enriching this instrument can be in a jazz environment. Julie Campiche's harp playing blends imperceptibly with Yael Miller's vocals to create an interplay of pastel timbres and dreamy moods, as fleeting and blown away as cloths in the wind. The airy character of these melancholy songs is enhanced by oriental lightness and playfulness, especially as Yael Miller sings with her distinctive voice not only in French and English, but also in her distinctive mother tongue, Hebrew.

Roland Merlinc on drums and Manu Hagmann on double bass ground the ethereal interplay between the two women with powerful sounds and rhythmic accentuation that betray a certain affinity to rock. Together with the warm vocals and the sparkling harp, an atmospheric density and a sonic contrast reminiscent of trip-hop is created at times. On the urgently rapped track Bachour Meshouamam you can also hear the Raï of the Maghreb.

Where drums and double bass threaten to displace the harp, Julie Campiche sometimes alienates the sound of her instrument. In the piece Isha she reverses it, which makes it sound electrically modern. In Old World you no longer recognize the sound of the harp - it sounds like an aggressive electric guitar. Yael Miller also elicits surprising facets from her voice at times, vocal noises reminiscent of Björk, which, however, seem to stem more from playful mischief than experimental commitment. How close most of the pieces are to pop songs is not only shown by Go Now that could have been written by Joanna Newsom. The album opens with a reduced and slowed-down version of Blackbird the Beatles classic.

Orioxy: Lost Children. GLM Music GmbH / Soulfood

In 2014, the 175th birthday of Friedrich Gernsheim (1839-1916) was celebrated much more quietly than that of his fellow composer Joseph Rheinberger (1839-1901), who was born in the same year. Like Rheinberger, Gernsheim was also a successful composer and important teacher during his lifetime. Engelbert Humperdinck was one of his students. He was friends with Johannes Brahms and in 1870 conducted the first complete performance of Brahms' German Requiem in memory of the victims of the Franco-Prussian War. Younger contemporaries also appreciated him; both Gustav Mahler and Richard Strauss conducted his Symphony No. 3 in C minor, op. 54 (Mirjam). After Gernsheim's death in 1916, his compositions gradually fell into oblivion. The performance ban imposed on Jewish composers in Nazi Germany in 1933 also had a devastating effect. By the end of the Second World War, his name had been almost completely erased from the music world's consciousness.

In recent years, there has been a renewed interest in his oeuvre. Several CDs of his four symphonies, numerous chamber music works and the virtuoso cello concerto have been released, which document the content of his music in the most beautiful way.

The 1914 Sonata in E minor op. 87 was premiered in Worms in September 2012 after almost 100 years of slumber and was published for the first time in 2014 by Dohr-Verlag in Cologne.

The extensive three-movement work presents both performers with rewarding tasks. The composer skillfully exploits the cello's range from low to high registers; the full-bodied piano part is sometimes reminiscent of Brahms. It is skillfully placed so that the cello cantilenas are not covered even in forte passages. The outer movements still breathe the spirit of the late Romantic period. There are occasional flashes of Dvořák or Grieg. The dramatic C minor middle section of the 2nd movement is particularly enjoyable, its sparkling piano arpeggios almost impressionistic.

The edition has been carefully edited and the music is very clearly and generously laid out. The preface, which is well worth reading, and the informative critical report also provide information on compositional connections to other works by Gernsheim.

Friedrich Gernsheim, Sonata in E minor op. 87 for violoncello and piano, first edition published by Christian Schmitt-Engelstadt, E. D. 11446, € 29.80, Edition Dohr, Cologne 2014

Apart from a few larger melodramatic works, the Russian composer Vladimir Rebikov, who was born in Krasnoyarsk, Siberia, in 1866 and died in Yalta in 1920, became known as a miniaturist. Many of his most original piano pieces make do with just one printed page and are limited to a single melodic or harmonic idea, comparable to preludes.

In his early Salonesque works, the musician, who trained in Moscow and Berlin, took Tchaikovsky and German late Romanticism as his starting point before developing his own piano style around 1900, which he expanded with impressionistic means of sound. He began experimenting with stereotypical fourths, whole-tone scales and short ostinati and even conquered new polytonal territory.

Les démons s'amusent and the barren Chansons blancheswhich are to be played on the white keys, could have been written by Satie. The radically anti-romantic Figurine chinoise provides a fine example of New Objectivity with just 24 bars.

Rebikov's often disturbingly short character pieces are far more than just sonically attractive miniatures. They are just as suitable for piano lessons as they are for the study of harmony, but above all for concert programs with a pictorial theme. They are also documents of a long-forgotten pioneer of modern music.

Markus Heinze has provided a representative selection of 15 easy to moderately difficult pieces with useful fingerings and intelligent commentaries, which occasionally also contain playing instructions.

Vladimir Rebikov, 15 Piano Pieces, edited by Markus Heinze, F 95053, Fr. 21.90, Robert Forberg (Ricordi), Berlin 2014

There are recorder schools for every target group from toddlers to adults; what was missing until now was a textbook specifically geared towards the needs of senior citizens aged 70 and over. For them Seniors make music: Recorderwith the aim of enabling beginners or late returners to make music in a group and on the various instruments of the recorder family within a short period of time. However, as the title and subtitle suggest ("Music for Mind & Soul - A Careful Course for Beginners and Returners"), the starting point does not seem to be sprightly golden agers, but people whose advanced age has brought with it a variety of limitations that need to be taken into account.

The large notation and the absence of poppy songs or a graphic presentation geared towards children's world of experience are praiseworthy. However, the fact that just one five-note range is worked out on around eighty pages - something that can usually be digested by adults in a single lesson - and that the parts in the four-part pieces, for example, are not arranged in score form so as not to confuse the players, or that on each page the range of notes already learned is repeated in a fingering diagram to save having to turn back if a note from the previous pages has already been forgotten, inevitably leaves the feeling that we are dealing with people who have lost their cognitive abilities along with their natural loss of sight. Consequently, the fingerings are only given as C-fingerings throughout, regardless of which instrument is actually required. The alto and bass flutes are therefore notated transposed, which is unusual for the recorder and makes it impossible to take up further literature. The accompanying CD with all the pieces in the course also leaves the listener rather perplexed in terms of phrasing, sound or articulation, even though the piano accompaniments notated in an accompanying booklet have been composed in attractive movements.

Today, older people are actively continuing their education in a wide variety of areas. Seniors make music: Recorder is missing the opportunity to teach them how to play an instrument in appropriate learning steps. For people with learning disabilities or mild cognitive deficits, on the other hand, it could be a suitable teaching aid - something that has been missing from the flute school market until now.

Barbara Hintermeier and Birgit Baude, Senioren musizieren: Recorder 1: A gentle course for beginners and late returners, for tenor or alto recorders, ED 21595, with CD, € 19.99, Schott, Mainz 2014

id., piano part and scores, booklet for volume 1, ED 21595-01, € 19.99

The simulator puts the practitioners in the backstage area of a stage as well as on the podium in front of an expectant virtual audience. The simulator was realized on the basis of a screen projection by the companies Studiohead and Skyline Whitespace.

The simulator can be used to simulate both a concert situation and an audition in front of a jury. The audience is able to react with both friendly encouragement and negative skepticism. A three-person jury takes notes, nods or shakes their heads. The audience applauds politely or enthusiastically.

The simulator also includes a recording facility for students to analyze their own performances. 

A video about the simulator can be found here.