He is undoubtedly one of the most profound connoisseurs of the Lucerne Festival: Erich Singer, who worked for the Festival from 1980 as head of the artistic office and editor of the program booklets. A positive as well as a negative circumstance, because anyone who is so close to an institution finds it difficult to maintain a critical distance.

We have been waiting a long time for the result of Singer's research, and now it is finally here under the title Lucerne Festival - From Toscanini to AbbadoA comprehensive, highly bibliophile "tome" of 400 pages with countless, previously unknown illustrations that you can linger over for hours - one of the great advantages of this festival history.

After reading the detailed text, however, one has to ask oneself where an interpretative author is at work and where this claim ends. Until the end of the Ulrich Meyer-Schoellkopf era, Singer more or less chooses the individual seasons as a structuring principle, presents programs for discussion or focuses on the debuts of important conductors or soloists. In the Matthias Bamert era, the design changes, with Singer now setting thematic priorities: "Festival within the Festival", "Composer in Residence" or "Late-Night Concerts" are the headlines. These are innovations that Bamert has introduced during his time in Lucerne.

This is followed by the "special year 1997", the demolition of the Kunsthaus and the guest performance in Emmen. Here, Singer suddenly has personalities interviewed by him, such as Bamert and Toni Krein, then head of the artistic office, tell their stories. A principle that the author also applies to the following "Gegenwart" from 1998 onwards, where he lets Artistic Director Michael Häfliger, President Hubert Achermann and others provide information on just 23 pages.

Singer describes this approach as an "accelerating procedure", which allows him to elegantly avoid friction with the current artistic director and also prevents the history of the festival from getting too out of hand. As far as the beginnings are concerned, they have been extensively researched and evaluated in a differentiated manner. Although there is nothing new about the myth of the anti-fascist "counter-festival" of 1938 with Toscanini, Singer aptly writes: "The political events acted, step by step, as a prerequisite for the Lucerne organizers' room for manoeuvre."

The way the author develops the story is always stimulating: the euphoria surrounding Toscanini, the financial blessing of the controversial Emil Bührle from 1942, the establishment of the festival orchestra that this made possible, the triumphant years with the charismatic conductors Wilhelm Furtwängler and Herbert von Karajan, the arrival of such renowned artists as Dinu Lipatti, Yehudi Menuhin and Clara Haskil - to name but a few.

It always gets exciting when Singer intervenes in a judgmental way, for example when he sums up Walter Strebi's presidency, because he "left ... the solvent audience in the cultural bourgeois belief that beautiful things must above all be served beautifully and festively". Or when he describes 1966 as a year of replacement: "André Cluytens died barely a year after his last Lucerne concert ..., while Bernhard Haitink and Claudio Abbado took to the Kunsthaus podium for the first time." The crisis of 1968 is also dealt with and the press reprimanded: "In short, every untruth and half-truth was exploited." At that time, the hour of professionalization struck for Lucerne, the introduction of the directorial principle "long practised and proven abroad". Rudolf Baumgartner was the first artistic director to place the entire program under a central theme.

Singer impressively describes Baumgartner's innovation, his consideration of modernity, his efforts to attract new audiences and his failure: "Baumgartner thus overshot the mark under the conditions and circumstances of his time. The artistic vision alone was not enough: the subsoil (audience, economy, local politics, etc.) was not (yet) able to swallow the overly loaded seed of uncompromising creativity."

While there is analysis here, the closer one gets to the present, the more descriptive the account remains. The background to the dissolution of the festival orchestra remains in the dark, and there is not a critical word about the festival's development in recent years. "As a former hotelier with an international clientele, he [Jürg R. Reinshagen, President of the Foundation Board until 2009] shifted the emphasis from the locally narrow, even provincial to the cosmopolitan," writes Singer, whose focus is on the huge expansion. The KKL has contributed a great deal to this.

Erich Singer: Lucerne Festival - From Toscanini to Abbado, 400 p., incl. DVD, Fr. 79.00, Pro Libro, Lucerne 2014,
ISBN 978-3-905927-03-0

As the youngest child of his famous father Wolfgang Amadeus, Franz Xaver Wolfgang Mozart stood in his father's shadow throughout his life. As his mother had already destined him to become a professional musician as a small child, he received composition and instrumental lessons from Johann Nepomuk Hummel, Antonio Salieri, Johann Georg Albrechtsberger and others in his hometown of Vienna. From 1813, he worked as a respected pianist and teacher in Lviv, from where he undertook an extensive European tour and organized numerous concerts there. He returned to Vienna in 1838.

His oeuvre, which mainly includes piano concertos, little chamber music and vocal works, has almost been forgotten today and is rarely heard in concert halls. One of his few chamber music compositions is the sonata movement for flute and piano, published at the beginning of 1810, in which, interestingly, the title Rondo fits neither the form nor the character of the composition. The work, which has only survived in manuscript form, was called a "sonata" by the composer. It is the first movement of an unfinished flute sonata that Mozart had promised to the Leipzig publisher Johann Gottfried Härtel.

The movement begins with a short, four-bar introduction that leads into the lyrical main theme, which is largely shaped by a calm, legato minor triad and is also followed by the vocal, lyrical secondary theme. The composer mostly fills in the transitions with garland-like, virtuoso runs. The rather compact form and lyrical character of the piece prompted contemporary critics to describe Mozart not as a master of form, but "his talent will probably allow him to find more success in genres where graceful, flattering melodies are the first priority". In a letter, Mozart himself describes the flute as an instrument "which suits my enthusiastic temperament quite well" and describes the sonata movement as "gentle and singing". The melodic design is audibly close to Franz Schubert, which could have something to do with the fact that both composers had Antonio Salieri as a teacher, who was one of the pioneers of Viennese Romanticism. In any case, as the editor Karsten Nottelmann notes at the end of the preface, Mozart's sonata movement "enriches" the small repertoire of original compositions for flute and piano from the 19th century with a truly "singing work".

Franz Xaver Mozart, Rondo in E minor for flute and piano, edited by Karsten Nottelmann, HN 1180, € 11.00, G. Henle, Munich 2013

Anyone who first thinks of the diagnostic possibilities of radioactive rays when they hear the name Julius Röntgen is not entirely wrong. The German-Dutch pianist and composer (*1855 in Leipzig, †1932 in Utrecht) was distantly related to the physicist Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen (1845-1923). Julius Röntgen's youngest son Joachim worked as concertmaster of the Winterthur Municipal Theater from 1928 and was first violinist in the Lucerne Festival Orchestra under Toscanini in 1938/39.

As a composer, Julius Röntgen emerged from the conservative Leipzig School, was associated with Brahms, but also absorbed influences from Grieg, Reger and Debussy. He wrote 21 symphonies, 14 concertos, two operas as well as songs and chamber music. His compositions have recently been rediscovered. Symphonies 3, 8, 15 and 18 as well as the violin, cello and piano concertos are already available on nine CDs (all on cpo).

And now the Offenburg String Trio has recorded Röntgen's late string trios. Cellist Martin Merker, who has also been active as a cellist with the Camerata Bern for many years, writes in his informative booklet text: "Julius Röntgen composed the string trios exclusively for playing music with his sons in the family circle, with the composer himself taking on the viola part."

The following were recorded Trios Nos. 13 to 16 from the years 1925-1930 are stylistically out of their time, are far removed from dissonant or even atonal harmony, but never seem boring or even hackneyed. They are all compositions of a high technical and artistic standard. Röntgen also had newer compositional techniques at his disposal, as his last works show, in which he experimented with atonality, bitonality and jazz influences. However, they are not used in the string trios.

The Trio No. 13 in A major (1925) sounds a little like Schubert, Mendelssohn and Brahms - albeit without direct stylistic reminiscences. In the Trio No. 14 in C minor (1928), Röntgen's own tone becomes clearer, a delicate and original exploration of the unexplored harmonic and structural possibilities of late Romantic music. The Trio No. 15 C sharp minor (1929) was composed on a five-week road trip, which also took Röntgen and his family through Switzerland. The "Finale automobilistico: Allegro energico" incorporates incidents in Reichenbach and Meiringen. The Trio No. 16 in C sharp minor (1930) crowns his work for this instrumentation in its depth of expression and stylistic homogeneity.

The Offenburg String Trio has recorded these works in an emotionally moving as well as tonally and technically sophisticated way, demonstrating that an encounter with Röntgen's music can still be an experience today.

It scrapes and grinds, snorts and stomps, creaks and scratches. Engine noise or workshop noise? Far from it: this is the sound world of Bernese record artist Christoph Hess, alias Strotter Inst. The scene of the action: the "Schrapper" level of the computer game Memoreille.

The memory app for iPad, iPhone or computer (an Android version is to follow) makes it possible to uncover sounds instead of pairs of pictures. Lurking beneath the virtual cards are 316 sound events, grouped into 30 levels and five levels of difficulty. The cards are "uncovered" with a tap of the finger or a click of the mouse, and even the first levels show that the game requires a lot of patience and concentration. The sound snippets are often confusingly similar and challenge even well-trained ears.

The idea for Memoreille was created by Biel composer, pianist and improvising electronic musician Gaudenz Badrutt. Together with programmer and game developer Roman Schmid, he created the sound memory with its uncluttered and simple design as part of a music education project for the Canton of Bern. Badrutt spent two and a half years working on this comparatively expensive app, which costs seven and ten francs respectively. "The price should reflect the value of this artistic product," he explained in the Bieler Tagblatt.

The sound snippets were composed by ten Swiss musicians: In addition to Strotter Inst. and Badrutt himself, they are BigZis, Christian Müller, Hans Koch, Jacques Demierre, Jonas Kocher, Jürg Kienberger, Maru Rieben and Ruedi Häusermann. They have created a variety of sounds that make the game a great listening experience. The levels have titles that sound just like the app itself: Here the imitated wind instruments and yawning sounds of Kienberger ("öhrli in the morning"), there the percussive memory cards of Rieben's "Klangkoffer" or there the humorous speech acrobatics of Franziska Schläfer alias BigZis ("Digidugu").

Up to six players - or as Badrutt calls it "twelve alert ears" - can compete against each other at the same time and for once not primarily train their visual memory, but rather their auditory memory. The players also become composers of new (random) music: at the end of a level, the game moves can be played as a coherent sound file.

This is how Memoreille is not only a challenging brain exercise for young and old, it is also a varied sound journey through Swiss creativity in new and experimental music. If that's not a successful example of music education.

Memoreille. Idea, artistic direction and concept: Gaudenz Badrutt; game development: Roman Schmid. Version for iPhone/iPad: Fr. 7.oo; for Mac/PC: Fr. 10.00; available in the Apple App Store or at: www.memoreille.ch

Blunt, who has already conducted Strauss' Ariadne on Naxos has been able to convince the jury, the current season will include Mozart's The Magic Flute (premiere November 23, 2014), writes Konzert Theater Bern.

British-born Thomas Blunt studied at Cambridge University and the Royal College of Music in London. From 2006 to 2009, he was choirmaster at the Glyndebourne Festival. He also made his conducting debut there with L' Elisire d' amore (2007); this was followed by Falstaff (2009) and La Cenerentola (2010). During this time he assisted the music director Vladimir Jurowski.

Recent engagements have taken the Briton to the Opéra National du Rhin, Strasbourg (2013), and the St. Endellion Festival (2014). In summer 2015, Blunt will perform Donizetti's Don Pasquale at the Longborough Festival Opera.

Do classical music festivals with a coherent program concept, tangible rehearsal work on site and a connection to the region and the performance space still exist? In today's festival euphoria, which is geared more towards mass appeal than such criteria or artistic processes, the question is justified. We are often served standardized programmes that use sounding names to disguise a lack of artistic concept.

However, there are classical music festivals that convey vitality through thematic limitation and competent programming. In addition to the Fribourg Festival, these include the Zurich Early Music Forum and the Basel Early Music Festival. The latter offers various events throughout the year in addition to the festival. While the Zurich festival covers a wide stylistic range with music from Gregorian chant to the 19th century, the Basel Festival is committed to promoting Basel graduates in the field of early music. With its focus on the central turning points of early music (last year it was the transition from the "prima pratica" to the "seconda pratica") and additional thematically related symposia, this festival is also very stimulating academically.

The Fribourg Festival International de Musiqes Sacrées is a stroke of luck. An almost popular openness gives it a personal character. The program features music that is open to different epochs and religious roots and often leads to immediate emotion. Profane and sacred, instrumental and vocal, Western and Oriental are effortlessly combined - this becomes particularly impressive if you attend all the concerts. For example, the Sufi maquâms are reminiscent of Neapolitan love songs, or the Andalusian Middle Ages meet baroque Catholicism.

Ideal space for voice architecture

The 15th Biennale took place in the week from July 5 to 12. With 14 concerts (two concerts per day), an atelier for Gregorian chant and a composition competition (this year's winner is Takahiro Sakuma with Asteroid Belt) offers a sophisticated program, with the Eglise du Collège Saint-Michel being part of the secret recipe. You could almost hear a feather drop in the perfectly proportioned baroque church. Here are four concerts to give you an impression of the exciting week.

In terms of choice of works, vocal transparency and vocal quality, the concert made a great impression. Eton Choirbook of the Belgian Huelgas Ensemble under the direction of Paul van Nevel made the greatest impression on me. From the rich collection of these works, which have miraculously survived into Anglicism, van Nevel selects five- to nine-part text settings dedicated to the Mother of God. The harmonic richness of the works by Sutton, Horewud, Sturton, Browne and Wylkynson is incredible. What a discrepancy between this delicate music and the intrigues of Henry the Eighth! The Huelgas ensemble sheds light on the architecture of the works and shows how the scoring stretches the conventional framework, how the voice imitations break like waves in daring harmonies, and also how the final phrases dissolve almost polytonally and the meandering registration takes on a life of its own. While in Johannes Sutton's Salute Regina the drama is heightened until the end and in the last lines the voices slide into an almost tearing tension, Edmundus Sturton's sublime flow of sound in Gaude Virgo Mater any sense of time. Music that leads melodically and harmonically to extremes, yet remains true to the constant pulsation, a vaporous flow. In Johannes Browne's Stabat mater dolorosa dynamics and rhythmic impulsiveness come to the fore. The almost overflowing melismatic ramifications are sung with ease by the Huelgas ensemble, even in the extreme treble. The relief-like voice leading emphasizes the contrapuntal depth of these Marian chants.

Catholicism, Sufism and popularism

Pino de Vittorio's explorations of Apulian piety seem almost naïve in comparison to this complex polyphony, but as a baroque contrast they are refreshing. Particularly in the anonymous songs and dances, in which he accompanies himself on the guitar, Pino de Vittorio demonstrates agogic vitality, communicative presence and rhetorical talent, although this does not conceal vocal weaknesses. His tenor voice is not very sustainable and his intonation is often uncertain. In Rocco Greco's symphonies, on the other hand, Rebecca Ferri (cello) and Patrizia Varone (harpsichord/organ) show pearls of matching sensitivity.

The concerto by the French-Moroccan ensemble Al-Adwâr is divided into two parts, which are not always easy to distinguish due to their improvisational structure. The concert begins with the eponymous Maqâm d'amoura composition by Aïcha Redouane (vocals and qânun) and Habib Yammine (vocals, riqq and daff), and ends with selected poems from the classical Nahda school, whose texts illustrate the elegance, openness and tolerance of the Sufi philosophy of life. It is a heterophonic and rhythmic music that transports mood changes from melancholy and exuberant joy to philosophical serenity through its wealth of Arabic ornamentation. Redouane's touching voice makes the verses about the synthesis of opposites at least emotionally comprehensible in their timeless message.

The concert by the Norwegian vocal sextet Nordic Voices is a special encounter, combining 16th century vocal polyphony (Clemens non Papa, Pierre de Manchicourt, Christobal Morales) with various interpretations of the Christmas mystery. The vocal sextet impresses with its beautiful voices, vitality and sense of musical gesture. In their elaborate choral sound, Arvo Pärt's Magnificat any kind of sedateness. The world premiere of O Magnum Mysterium by Swiss composer René Oberson, a work commissioned by the festival, which builds up various elements of compositional technique into a dynamic, finely tuned harmony. Henrik Ødegaard works with folkloristic elements in his more radical version. The composition, interspersed with primal screams, overtone singing and Steve Reich minimalism, is not lacking in immediate effects that refreshingly transform the mystery of the birth of God into loud cheerfulness. Lasse Thoresen's Solbøn begins with the second interval, dark and restful. It is impressive how the Norwegian ensemble uses a rich palette of moods and vocal techniques, oscillating between the vocal and instrumental, as it were. Falsetto, yodeling and whooping give the sun song an intense radiance.

The 16th edition of the Festival International de Musiqes Sacrées will take place in two years' time. It is to be hoped that this biennial, which has existed since 1986 and is masterfully directed by Pierre Tercier, will remain true to its self-confident attitude. It offers a valuable forum for dialog, for the preservation and renewal of sacred music.

Three older gentlemen with suspenders set up the room for their musical rehearsal. They push the walls and chairs into place, mumble to themselves and arrange their props. As they move around, two cowbells sound as if by chance in a common chord, one from the right, one from the left. But at the latest when the pushing noise of the chairs turns into a three-part piece of music, it is clear that the piece is about Ländler want a say nothing is left to chance at the Kapelle Eidgenössisch Moos. The trio led by Ruedi Häusermann opens the festival Schweizgenössisch - Die Schweiz in Berlin with a charming mixture of music theater, concert, tourist tour and public rehearsal. Their aim is not to avoid clichés. Rather, it seems as if the three musicians have set themselves the task of forcing all, really all ideas on this subject, even the silliest ones, into one evening: The music of Ländlerkönig Kasi Geisser, texts by Robert Walser, appearances by animals, a "choir doubler" realized with technical means, a yodelling machine ... The three devote themselves to all theatrical means with seriousness and musical precision. Poetic, subtle, funny, concentrated, overloaded and sonically dense moments alternate and finally culminate in a "convivial finale" with Swiss folk music on the banks of the Spree and in the evening sunshine: a very nice opening!

The music of the Yilian Cañizares Quartet from Lausanne is less rooted in Switzerland than in the world. The singer and violinist Yilian Cañizares, who comes from Havana, leads the audience through her varied program in Spanish, French and English. South American dance rhythms and unison jazz lines alternate with floating, esoteric ballads. The radiant Cañizares in the white dress takes samba steps, shakes her curls, improvises with violin and voice at the same time, always supported by the solid basic sound of her band. However, pianist Daniel Stawinski is particularly convincing as a soloist, who for this one moment is completely absorbed in the music, lost in it and takes you along on the waves of his piano playing.

Claude-Alain Sulzer's event, on the other hand, leaves one rather perplexed. One under the title Anna's mask The program says to expect a literary concert developed especially for the festival. Sulzer reads from his novella of the same name, which deals with the life of Swiss singer Anna Suttner - and in particular the scandalous circumstances of her death. We learn right at the beginning that she was shot. About her lover. And that she was a famous performer of Carmen. In between, a long-winded recitation of the biographies of all those involved in a self-congratulatory, overflowing style, mostly without punchlines, and also, again and again and for a very long time: music! Benjamin Nyffenegger on the cello and Oliver Schnyder on the piano play with virtuosity and feeling. What the Rachmaninov Sonata is supposed to have to do with the narrative, however, cannot be seen for the life of me. The novella's already rather thin arc of suspense is stretched over several episodes and musical interludes - which in no way improves a narrative with few surprises. What was developed here especially for the festival?

Jürg Kienberger, although a comedian, is not necessarily a master of timing either. His program I bee, ergo buzzin which he deals with the life and death of bees, begins with the appearance of a solo entertainer on the keyboard. The disguised Kienberger fires up the audience with thigh-slappers on a par with the title of his piece - and does himself no favors by closing the audience's ears to the finer things right at the beginning. And yet these are the greatest moments of his program: when a slight melancholy, when a forlornness becomes palpable: that of the bees, that of Jürg Kienberger, and the lost position on which everyone who deals with the small world of bees seems to have always stood. A beehive stands on the stage the whole time, from which a constant buzzing can be heard almost imperceptibly. At the end it has fallen silent. It is touching and sad when Kienberger picks up the glass organ and sings in a high, fragile voice: "What do we want to sing now, here in solitude, when all of us have gone, whom our song delights ..." The audience, which is eager to laugh, can't stand it and applauds in the middle of the floating last note. It's a shame that Kienberger's misguided dramaturgy takes the sting out of it.

The festival concluded with the music theater When I die directed by Thom Luz. Several keyboard instruments stand on the otherwise empty stage: pianos, a Wurlitzer, a glass harmonica. A woman sits at the piano with a porcelain cup on top. Slowly and in several attempts, she pushes the cup off the edge so that it falls with a clatter. The ticking of a clock comes to the fore. A male quartet sings English pop songs, the woman interrupts. It's about the life of Rosemary Brown, who in the 1960s claimed to be a medium and to be visited by deceased composers, most notably Franz Liszt. The composers would dictate the missing parts of unfinished compositions to her. The stage becomes an intermediate world. Imaginary space, apartment, sound space, concert hall, afterlife, death chamber. The composers appear, whisper, make music, disappear again. Rosemary Brown sings in a thin voice, plays along, speaks along, interrupts. Large black boxes roll across the stage as if by magic. Everything is darkened, dusky, shrouded in fog. The performers appear only as silhouettes against the light. And as voices that sing, speak, whisper.

When I die is a subtly arranged evening that uses all theatrical means, above all music, to tell the story of the unconscious. The characters and events remain strangely intangible and ambiguous, and everything seems somewhat removed. On the way out, it feels as if you've just seen a ghost.

The dual aim of "pure" intonation and reviving the music of ancient Greece occupied composers, theorists and instrument makers from the Renaissance to the 18th century. This resulted in numerous compositions, some of them innovatively notated, as well as keyboard and string instruments with additional keys or frets. Martin Kirnbauer proposes the term "polyphonic" for all these musical experiments with more than twelve notes. He chooses a particularly eventful period from the centuries-long preoccupation with polyphony: the situation in Rome under Pope Urban VIII. Barberini (1623-1644). Kirnbauer examines the practical circumstances surrounding the performance of chromatic and enharmonic music and the scope of the confrontation with the ancient genera.

First of all, André Maugars' reports on polyphonic music practice in Rome, which were published around 1639 in his Réponse faite à un curieux sur le sentiment de la musique d'Italie are placed in their context. Domenico Mazzocchi had just published his Dialoghi, e sonetti and its Madrigali a cinque voci (both published in Rome in 1638). Their places of performance, the circles around Giulio Raimondo Mazzarini and Cardinal Francesco Barberini, are described with their diverse cultural points of reference. Giovanni Battista Doni provided a theoretical framework for these efforts. He studied the ancient scales and partly realized his plans for new string, plucked and keyboard instruments. Music by Pietro Eredia, Luigi Rossi, Virgilio Mazzocchi and Pietro della Valle was written in this environment.

Cardinal Francesco Barberini's experimental viola da gamba ensemble is particularly noteworthy. In his "accademia delle viole", "madrigali al tavolino" were mostly performed instrumentally, not only Carlo Gesualdo's works from the beginning of the century, but also new compositions by Michelangelo Rossi, Domenico dal Pane and others. As late as the 1680s, Alessandro Scarlatti was still writing works in this old-fashioned genre for Christina of Sweden's Roman court. Apart from his madrigals, further echoes of polyphonic music can perhaps be found in the chromatic slow movements of the "Sonate a quattro senza cembalo" (Four Sonata a quattroed. by Rosalind Halton, Edition HH, Launton 2014). Several sections of Athanasius Kircher's encyclopaedic Musurgia Universalis from 1650 with the musical examples of Galeazzo Sabbatini and Emperor Ferdinand III printed in it can be related to the circle of Doni and Barberini.

The fact that Kirnbauer's habilitation thesis at the University of Basel (2006) is now available as the third volume in a series of publications by the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis already indicates his close connection to musical practice. The musicologist, who works as a curator for musical instruments at the Museum of Music in Basel, has also tested polyphonic music in practice and supervised its recording on several CDs (Canzon del Principe for Divox antiqua, La Tavola Cromatica for surround sound, Domenico Mazzocchi: Musiche sacre, e morali for AS Musique). The technical details of the tunings are clearly presented; the description of the cultural-historical context and the many discussions of the works characterize the book. The extensive appendix contains longer excerpts, in some cases entire works from this exciting repertoire. Kirnbauer convincingly proves, as announced in the preface, that the testimonies of polyphonic music are "more than footnotes in the historiography of music": They represent a practical expansion of tonal space with far-reaching consequences for composition and performance practice.

Martin Kirnbauer, Vieltönige Musik: Spielarten chromatischer und enharmonischer Musik in Rom in der ersten Häfte des 17. Jahrhunderts, (=Schola Cantorum Basiliensis Scripta, Vol. 3), 405 p., Fr. 68.00, Schwabe, Basel 2013, ISBN 978-3-7965-2735-7

The two new Urtext editions of Niccolò Paganini's 24 Capricci op. 1 expose many deviations of older editions from the Ricordi first printings of 1820 and 1836, which are based on the autograph of 1817. In 1974 Ricordi published a facsimile of the autograph, and on the website imslp.org anyone can download and study it free of charge. It is absolutely fascinating, but the notes are difficult to read; the Urtext editions now help in various ways.

The publishers Peters (1986), Ricordi (1988) and Henle (1990) issued such editions before the ones under discussion here. Henle skillfully illustrates the interpretation notes and corrections of the older editions with bar-by-bar excerpts from the facsimile. Philippe Borer also takes a closer look in his detailed and readable dissertation (see my Review in the SMZ 4/2001, S. 39) from the facsimile, which he prints there in full. I could briefly summarize the scope of this dissertation with a quotation from it by Jacques Thibaud: Paganini let the result of his studies as an autodidact culminate "in a combination of all violinistic traditions with modernity".

Bärenreiter's merit is a typographically perfect objectivity without additions. In Capriccio 6 the tremolo fingers are printed clearly and space-savingly with whole notes in Paganini's notation - optionally with 64th-note bars in the modern style. But with many Capricci turn the page. The genesis and publication history as well as the critical report on all the first sources and their differences are very detailed. Interesting are the metronome markings for all Capricci of the French first edition Richault 1824 as a document of early interpretation practice. A nice addition are the two pages with the 24 Contradanze Inglesi each of 16 bars, a first print from the Paul Sacher Foundation in Basel. They were written by Paganini for a prince's carnival festivities and were probably improvised with variations and other instruments for dancing.

Niccolò Paganini, 24 Capricci and 24 Contradanze Inglesi for violin solo, Urtext edited by Daniela Macchione, BA 9424, € 16.95, Bärnreiter Kassel, 2013

Mario Hossen's work for Doblinger concentrates on absolute fidelity to the text through comparison with the autograph and Ricordi 1820 and on performance practice with many suggestions for lively articulation and dynamics, underpinned with quotations from Johann Joachim Quantz, Leopold Mozart and Leopold Auer. Embarrassing is the typographical error in the English text in the second line of the second page of the preface: "stuffing" instead of "stifling". (Philippe Borer pointed this out to me; he had published this quote in English in 1997 and should have been cited as the source). Valuable in the comments to each Capriccio are the precise references to corrections of traditional errors and the somewhat subjective suggestions for interpretation. With the suggestion that in Capriccio 16 I do not agree at all with the idea of playing the semiquavers with a horizontal bow in the upper half ["à la française", author's note]. Karl Guhr wrote: "Paganini alone makes the bow make more of a leaping, whipping movement [i.e. sautillé, author's note], using almost the middle of the bow for this purpose ... ". In addition, all large leaps should preferably be played in one position over three strings, so that the notes marked forte come to rest on the G string and thus acquire their meaning. Most of Hossen's fingerings are usable, but with unnecessary repetitions within a position. In some places I would prefer an extension into a neighboring position to an additional change of position, or in the case of changes of position in scale runs, a sequence of more than two fingers, with changes in semitones and the same fingering an octave higher. The five fold-out pages are luxurious, ensuring that the notes are never crowded, and only two four-page pages are used. Capricci - 4 and 24 - must be turned around. A "practical Urtext".

Niccolò Paganini, 24 Capricci, Urtext edited by Mario Hossen, Diletto Musicale, DM 1461, € 18.95, Doblinger, Vienna 2013

The exhibition presents 200 works by Dieter Roth, ranging from works on paper and editions to installations in which music plays a role. It will be accompanied by numerous events in Zug and Basel.

Among other things, the Vera Oeri Library of the Musik-Akademie Basel is showing a selection of documents from the archive of the Musik-Akademie, where Dieter Roth played his legendary quadruple concert in 1977 at the invitation of the then director Friedhelm Döhl ("Can anyone play the piano here?" Music and other objects by Dieter Roth, September 30, 2014 to January 31, 2015).

The exhibition is a cooperative project between the research department of the Basel University of Music (FHNW), the Kunsthaus Zug and the Lucerne publishing house Edizioni Periferia. A comprehensive collection of material can be found at www.dieterrothmusic.ch

Picture: Rarely heard music, skimming symphony. The Skimming. Concert at the Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus, Munich, Feb. 3, 1979, Photo: Roland Fischer, © Dieter Roth Estate Courtesy Hauser & Wirth

A production and design concept for the chamber opera is required White rose by Udo Zimmermann. The technical requirements of the Cologne Opera must be taken into account. Stage plans and technical data will be provided by Camerata Nuova after registration for the competition. Registration deadline is November 30, 2014.

The concept must be submitted to the Camerata Nuova in Wiesbaden in writing and with sketches, possibly with a stage design model, by December 31, 2014. The final will take place in May 2015 as part of the Opera Europa spring conference. The jury is made up of directors and experts from the European opera scene. The winning concept will be performed at the Cologne Opera in the 2016/2017 season.

Every two years, Opera Europa, an association of over 150 European opera houses, and the Wiesbadener Camerata Nuova e. V., an association of opera lovers, announce the EOP - European Opera Directing Prize, a competition for young opera directors. Three prizes are awarded, with prize money of 30,000 euros.

More info:
www.camerata-nuova.com
 

Klaus Hubmann, Managing Director HabitatStephan Schmidt, Director of the Music Academy and Bernhard Ley, Head of the Jazz Department at the Basel University of Music, were clearly delighted when they presented the new jazz campus to a huge crowd of media representatives. Visibly proud, but also modest and grateful, they talked about the advantages of this fairytale building at Utengasse 15/17, right in the heart of Kleinbasel. And the journalists rubbed their eyes in disbelief. What they saw here no longer exists in culture and education today - unless you meet people who are interested and have the financial means to do so. This is what happened when "Mr. Jazz School" Bernhard Ley was supported in his search for new school premises by the Habitat and Levedo was unexpectedly presented with the proposal to realize a new jazz campus as part of the neighbourhood revitalization plans on Utengasse.

In this miraculous way, a small school with a total of 250 pupils, 64 students and 45 teachers was able to enjoy what is essentially an oversized temple to music with an infrastructure that is unique in the world. It was agreed not to disclose the money involved, but the total costs are likely to be in the upper double-digit million range.

The best is just good enough

The initial situation was paradisiacal: in 2008, three years before the start of construction, people began to think about it. Foundation managers, architects, teachers and students went out into the "green field" and thought up the ideal school. They looked at a number of schools abroad and organized brainstorming sessions and seminars with students. Ideas, wishes and "nice-to-haves" were collected. Construction began in May 2011. The old factory and residential buildings were all demolished. Only the protected front building on Utengasse was retained. In order for the construction work to take place at all, parts of a historic adjacent building had to be dismantled and then rebuilt. The architects Buol&Zünd created a new building with a historicizing aesthetic, with parts of the building in light-coloured exposed brick arranged at different angles to each other. The two basement floors, the first floor and the four upper floors of the new school building contain a volume of 23,400m3 and almost 6000 m2 of gross floor area, which corresponds to 30 detached houses. The inner courtyard retains its original slope. Under a brick arbor, an open-air fireplace invites you to linger in comfort.

No savings were made on materials, on the contrary. They were never satisfied with the second-best solution, even if the best was three times as expensive. Acoustically, the best possible concept was realized. Before the 49 music rooms were individually equipped, sound absorbers were installed in a test room to simulate the acoustic properties. Each room was deliberately given its own acoustics; the high, mid and low frequency absorbers were arranged differently to take account of the different sound preferences of the musicians and the special features of the instruments. In addition to two superbly equipped studios with recording rooms, the spacious rooms include a jazz club, a performance hall, a recording hall and a movement hall, each with an area of well over 100 m2.

The extremely high demands on the building acoustics required a solid construction. The optimally insulated outer shell ensures very low energy consumption and has the highest level of sound insulation. The two studios were built as a "house within a house". There is a space between the two walls without sound bridges, so that not even a helicopter can be heard directly overhead. The studios are equipped with both digital and analog recording technology, which is exclusive these days. All rooms are individually connected with separate ventilation ducts to fifteen monoblocks in the second basement. This avoids sound bridges between the rooms. Each room is also electrically autonomous and equipped with its own fuses.

A rare constellation
What has happened to Bernhard Ley over the past three decades is indeed like a fairytale, a fairytale in which the current Director of the Jazz Department at the University of Music was a key player. As a student of jazz guitar at the Graz University of Music, he was still spinning the threads. When he returned to his home town, he was able to start teaching in the "Jazzcasino" on a purely private basis. In 1991, a supporting association was founded for the purpose of establishing a professional department recognized by the Swiss Music Pedagogical Association (SMPV). Five years later, the center moved to Reinacherstrasse. In 1999/2000, a "to zero" decision in the Grand Council made it possible to integrate the professional department into the Basel Music Academy. The General Department followed suit in 2007. The enterprising director had hardly got the General Department under his belt when he thought one step further. As the premises on Reinacherstrasse were gradually becoming too cramped and the infrastructure no longer met the requirements of an internationally oriented school, Ley set about looking for a new home. As part of the redesign of the Volkshaus on Claraplatz, he evaluated a possible collaboration. The Habitat Foundation got wind of this - and the rest is history.

The Jazzcampus is a school for the ages - the buzzword "sustainability" is just the first name here - which is already causing a stir in the scene worldwide. Bernhard Ley also anticipates a strong internationalization of the student and lecturer body. The Jazzcampus is designed as an open school that is accessible to students and teaching staff 24 hours a day. It will also be open to the city. The jazz club, designed for an audience of 150, is intended to attract the public and get them excited about jazz.

www.jazzcampus.com

As the V. International Congress for Church Music 2015 states in its call for entries, recital programs by organists aged 35 and under are required "that combine creation, interpretation, mediation and research in a new, exemplary way and place contemporary and older music in a meaningful context. The concert should last approximately 50 minutes. The main organ and the wind-dynamic organs of Bern University of the Arts are available as instruments."

For the first round, the detailed concert program and a DVD with a short prelude must be submitted by 31 October 2014. Four winners will be selected from the submissions to perform in Bern Minster on March 20, 2015. The winner of this round will open the V International Church Music Congress with a concert in Bern Minster on October 21, 2015.

Further information:
www.kirchenmusikkongress.ch
 

In a motion, SVP National Councillor Sebastian Frehner from Basel-Stadt is calling for an amendment to the Federal Act on Unfair Competition (UWG), which stipulates that tickets for concerts and sporting events may not be more expensive than the price originally set if they are resold.

In its response, the Federal Council now explains that the free determination of the price is also part of free competition when reselling products and services. The resale itself is an expression of freedom of contract and a legitimate form of exercising property rights.

Anyone who buys a ticket for admission to concerts, sporting events or other events online must also be able to resell their ticket. The resale of tickets by individuals is also unlikely to cause any problems.

On gray markets, on the other hand, professional secondary ticket sellers sometimes offer tickets at inflated prices before the official presale starts or immediately afterwards, either on site or via a platform on the internet. In their general terms and conditions, the organizers stipulate that the tickets cannot be resold. However, this prohibition can hardly be enforced against the end customers.

The traders operating on the gray market usually buy the tickets using sophisticated computer programs or use groups of school-age young people to buy them and then sell them on to a larger number of people at inflated prices. This can trigger an artificial shortage of supply, at least temporarily, which drives up prices. This practice may violate applicable law, in particular the prohibition of deception in the Federal Act of December 19, 1986 against Unfair Competition.

Nevertheless, the Federal Council recommends that Parliament rejects the Frehner motion. In its view, it goes too far.
 

The first prize is endowed with 10,000 francs. Korean bass Jisang Ryu took second place (6,000 francs) and Swiss baritone Alexandre Beuchat third (4,000 francs). The latter has also been awarded the scholarship for the best candidate with Swiss citizenship (CHF 8,000).

The special prizes for a debut concert at the Lucerne Festival and for contemporary song at the Davos Festival go to the German mezzo-soprano Silke Gäng, while the special prize for a concert at the Menhuin Festival Gstaad goes to Juliette Raffin-Gay (soprano).

The jury consisted of representatives from top-class opera houses and festivals as well as the composer Dieter Ammann, the soprano Christiane Iven and the musicologist Stephan Mösch.

Anush Hovahannisyan began her training in her home country. From 2010 to 2013, she studied in Patricia Hay's class at the Royal Conservatory of Scotland, where she obtained her Master's degree. Since 2013 she has been a member of the Jette Parker Young Artists Program at the Royal Opera House in London, Covent Garden. In 2012 she won the Clonter Opera Prize, the Margaret Dick Voice Award and the Ye Cronies Opera Award as well as 3rd prize in the Les Azuriales singing competition (France).