David Philip Hefti is now one of the established Swiss composers of the younger generation. His multifaceted oeuvre is excellently documented both editorially and discographically.

The Klangscherben - Mosaic for violoncello solo was commissioned by the solo cellist of the Tonhalle Orchestra, Thomas Grossenbacher, in spring 2011. The content of the work refers to the cello concerto written in 2010 Counter sound. The composer writes: "Entire passages are torn out of their context and reformed, turned into shards, as it were, and glued together again. These combinations result in a colorful mosaic that allows the original motifs to appear in a new light."

This intention is also reflected in the correspondingly designed musical text, whose individual sections are presented in an almost collage-like manner. The very demanding, approximately 10-minute work offers the cellist a (tonally) colorful, varied palette of musical and technical tasks.

David Philip Hefti: Klangscherben, mosaic for violoncello solo, GM 1876, Fr. 15.80, Edition Kunzelmann, Adliswil 2012

Michael Töpel, born in 1958, studied composition, piano, music theory and musicology in his native city of Bremen and in Lübeck. He has received several prizes for composition. In addition to his own works, he has also written piano reductions and edited works, including first editions by Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy, Johannes Brahms, Hugo Distler and Jean Barraqué.

The present work, created in the Swiss mountains Capriccio for violoncello solo was a contribution to the anniversary concert on September 22, 2012 for the 175th anniversary of the Merseburg publishing house. It consists of exactly 175 bars and is composed in a moderately modern tonal language. The music is humorous, with a burlesque, dance-like rhythm. The composition is appropriate for the instruments, effective and shows a dynamic rich in contrast. The technical difficulties are easy to master.

The Capriccio is suitable for concert use and can also be a welcome introduction to newer music for advanced young cellists.

Michael Töpel: Capriccio, for violoncello solo, EM 2175, € 8.00, Merseburger Verlag, Kassel 2012

Since the universities of applied sciences have been called upon to conduct their own research, the world of science has been enriched by a number of projects. Interpretation research is a particularly popular area, which is also being worked on at Bern University of the Arts. All of the relevant projects currently underway at the Conference Improvise - Interpret presented to the public and discussed with external guests: Richard Wagner in historical performance practice, pianistic improvisations from Beethoven's time, the work of Alfred Wälchli, a new, sensory-dynamic double bass clarinet as well as historically informed didactics of music theory based on Peter Cornelius' work. The five symposia spread over two weekends featured a number of parallel events, which led to unfortunate overlaps. Those interested in Wagner could hardly hear any lectures on piano improvisations. Among other things, Giorgio Sanguinetti discussed the partimento in Beethoven's time, Michael Lehner looked at Carl Czerny's model compositions as a guide to fantasizing, Sonja Wagenbichler reported on pianistic competitions in 18th and 19th century Vienna. Petra Somlai and Leonardo Miucci contributed to the practical relevance of the topic in lunchtime and evening concerts and demonstrated very different styles of (partially) improvised music on fortepianos.

The orchestral musician's perspective
Also at the symposium Richard Wagner historically. Interpretation practice for the premiere of The Flying Dutchman in 1843 the close connection between science and practice was always palpable. The very idea of making the orchestral parts of the premiere in Dresden the starting point for the study reveals the perspective of an orchestral musician. It comes from Kai Köpp, who currently holds an SNSF professorship at the HKB. Köpp is a musicologist as well as a violist and contributed to the 2005 recording of the Dutchmen in historical performance practice under the direction of Bruno Weil.
The Dresden orchestral parts, which have not yet been studied, contain considerably more practical information than the autograph score due to the rehearsal practice of the time: Wagner did not rehearse his opera with the singers with piano accompaniment, as is customary today, but with a string quartet - and this is how the actual "last-hand version" was created.

If the quartet rehearsal parts have also been preserved for other operas, this opens up a large field of research, Köpp stated. The philological problem of how to date the sometimes diverse entries of parts used in operas over decades must be dealt with on a case-by-case basis. In any case, interpretation research is moving towards studies of individual performance situations. The great regional differences and the rapid changes in interpretation practice make general statements about the performance practice of a particular period almost obsolete.

Drawing from the premiere of the "Flying Dutchman"

wikimedia commons

Tempo, line-up, instruments
A real paradigm shift in historical performance practice would also be the investigations into the metronome markings in Wagner's Dutchman Thomas Seedorf stated, following on from the lecture by Bernese piano teacher Manuel Bärtsch. From now on, the focus will no longer be on particularly fast tempi, but on particularly slow ones. Whether and how the sometimes extremely slow tempi notated by Wagner can be realized at all - for example in the overture, which, with a dotted half note = 72, is far removed from the frenzy of today's interpretations - and how this additional time can be filled on stage, will have to be shown in future practical experiments.

Tobias Pfleger showed the difficulties Wagner had with the Dresden court orchestra, which was conservative in many respects, such as the disputes over authority with the concertmaster: pictures of the Dresden orchestra set-up at the time showed a conductor standing directly behind the prompter's box, facing the stage and thus giving the singers the beat. Behind him was the orchestra, which played towards the stage. The concertmaster took the beat from the conductor and passed it on to the orchestra, and therefore saw himself as the actual conductor of the orchestra.

The lecture by Bernhard Hentrich from Dresden seemed like the presentation of a crime script: The string instruments of the Dresden court orchestra in Wagner's time. What Hentrich uncovered is so explosive that he has so far avoided presenting his findings in Dresden: It was not the devastating air raids of 1945 that made the valuable instruments of the court chapel untraceable, but the confusing circumstances of the post-war period. His research into all the surviving inventory lists suggests that quite a few musicians and administrative staff wanted to "save cultural assets from Bolshevism". They sometimes exchanged cheap replicas for valuable instruments without making a note of it. Anyone researching the instruments used by Wagner during his time in Dresden today may come across such a replica instrument - and could draw fatal conclusions for performance practice.

Prefer traditional?
200 years of Wagner - ready for historical performance practice? was the provocative title of the panel discussion on the first evening of the symposium. The current phenomena to which this multi-perspective title refers became clear again and again in the course of the symposium. On the one hand, there is the general - not only Wagner-related - anniversary actionism. Certainly, the Bern University of the Arts is also using Richard Wagner's 200th birthday as an opportunity to present the results of this research project in a concert performance of the Dutchmen to present their findings. On November 22, students will put the findings into practice and make them accessible to a wide audience.

But the meandering movement of historically informed performance practice is also addressed here. It is true that today there are hardly any calls for historical performance practice to be primarily concerned with forgotten repertoire. However, the necessity of reconstructing historical circumstances even in the case of an oeuvre such as Wagner's, which has had an unbroken performance tradition since its creation, has rarely been recognized to date. Interpretations such as the concert performance of the Parsifal under Thomas Hengelbrock, which caused a sensation in Dortmund, Essen and Madrid at the beginning of this year, and about which Peter Tilling, Hengelbrock's assistant at the time (and now deputy general music director at the Nuremberg State Theater), gave an impressive account at the symposium, remain the exception.

And finally, the question of the openness of musicologists is also implicitly raised here. Orchestral parts, metronome markings etc., such as those studied by the Bern Wagner project, have so far been neglected by philologically oriented historical musicology; their existence has often been relegated to the footnotes of complete critical editions, where they are difficult for practical musicians to find. University musicology would do well not to regard such practical performance research as marginal or competitive, but as an enrichment.

Image: The Flying Dutchman (Uvejr i Skærgården. "Den flyvende hollænder", Dalarö), painting by August Strindberg, 1892, Copenhagen State Art Museum, photographed by www.smk.dk and soeg.smk.dk, wikimedia commons

The focus of the first DVD - after an overview of elementary music and dance pedagogy EMTP - is dedicated to reflection in the form of a theme-centered summary of interviews with experts and discussion rounds with home residents, a caregiver and students of the Carl-Orff-Institute. The book concludes with insights into the lives of two residents who took part in the weekly musical program for many years.

The discussion of the questions "Why music? What is the intrinsic value of music?", always in relation to scientific findings and the importance of emotionality. The connection between music and long-term memory ("well-known songs are even stored with several verses until old age") is addressed as well as the psychosomatic effect of music, i.e. the questions: "What significance did music have in earlier life, what effect does music have today?". It is shown how EMPT adapts to people's life stories and draws conclusions for practice. Statements from senior citizens explain the practical relevance: "Music is accessible to everyone. Music lifts the mood. You can feel that you are alive. Everyone is who they are." In this sense, music is part of biography work, part of rewriting one's own history. But it's also about learning new things and being challenged.

The strong reference to the importance of music in life lays the foundations for training and further education at the Carl Orff Institute in the field of music geragogy and clearly defines the difference to elementary music education: It is not education that is required, but education that takes biography into account without staging an infantilization of music.

DVD 2 is dedicated to practice and, after an introduction, shows many examples, divided into three core areas with a further division into 15 subject areas. The practical examples are aesthetically profound, the selection of songs and pieces of music is varied and the materials are balanced. The lecturer Christine Schönherr and the participating students impress with their performative and professional musicality. This basic artistic quality, characterized by aesthetic design, respect and theoretical understanding, provides a unique basis for all participants to join in.

Among other things, the canton will become more involved in supporting Geneva's cultural beacons. This includes investment projects at the Nouvelle Comédie and the ongoing operation of the Grand Théâtre. The canton also intends to increase its support for the expansion of the Historical Museum.

To implement the law, a consultative cultural council (Conseil consultatif de la culture) is to be set up in the next stage in 2014. The aim of the cooperation is "a coherent cultural policy of the city and canton as well as facilitating access to culture for all".

Its origins lie in 1957: the American composer Max Mathews composed the first digital work in music history on an IBM 709 computer. It is 17 seconds long and sounds just as strange today as the analog ring modulators used by Karlheinz Stockhausen, Karel Goeyvaerts and Gottfried Michael Koenig in Cologne. Little happened immediately after 1957. It was not until the 1970s that things got going: the first conference for computer music was held in 1974. From 1977, the Computer Music Journalwhich to this day reflects developments that can only be reconciled with instrumentology and harmony theory to a very limited extent.

This is also true of the Signals, Systems and Sound Synthesis. Gerald Bennett, founder of the former Zurich Institute for Computer Music and Sound Technology, has taken the trouble to translate the book published by Martin Neukom in 2003, including a number of revisions and additions. The result is a standard work, albeit one for specialists. On the one hand, this is due to the flood of new composition programs and the diversification of digital music production, which encompasses such heterogeneous areas as Fast Fourier Transformation, granular synthesis and working with Max patches. On the other hand, the complexity lies in the methodology. Neukom's arguments are strictly mathematical. Even relatively simple acoustic fundamentals such as the propagation of sound waves or the differentiation between sound strength and sound intensity quickly expand into complex problem areas that the skilled acoustician may understand, but which elude the comprehension of the less numerate music historian.

Neukom and Bennett have included a CD with the more than 600-page tome, which offers sound examples in addition to the complete book content. As most of the files are written in unusual programming languages such as Mathematica Notebooks, Csound or C/C++, it is necessary to download special applications such as a Wolfram CDF Player. However, if you do not have a current operating system, you will have to limit yourself to the fortunately traditionally printed pages.

Martin Neukom Signals, Systems and Sound Synthesis, translated into English by Gerald Bennett, 619 p., Fr. 110.00, with CD, Peter Lang Verlag, Bern 2013, ISBN 978-3-0343-1428-2

The edition of Antonín Dvořák's monumental Second Cello Concerto in B minor op. 104 is a long tale of woe. If you compare conventional editions (including those claiming to be the "Urtext"), you quickly notice striking discrepancies between the score, solo part and orchestral material. The new Bärenreiter edition finally does away with this. Jonathan Del Mar has examined all the surviving sources extremely conscientiously, including two that had previously been either ignored or greatly underestimated.

The influence of the cellist and dedicatee Hanuš Wihan is also documented in detail. Del Mar proves that not only were certain passages in Dvořák's autograph written by him, but that some details in the orchestral parts were also written by him. This proves how closely the two musicians worked together during the creation of the work.

The efforts resulted in a standard-setting edition that restores Dvořák's definitive version of the solo part for the first time since the concerto was first published in 1896. It differs from all modern editions in almost every bar. Hundreds of corrections were also made to the orchestral parts. The Critical Report, available separately in English, is particularly informative in this respect.

It is to be hoped that this edition will quickly establish itself as standard material.

Antonín Dvořák: Concerto per Violoncello in B minor op. 104, Urtext edited by Jonathan Del Mar; Score, BA 9045, € 55.00; arrangement for violoncello and piano by the composer BA 9045-90, € 14.95; Critical Report, BA 9045-40, € 29.95; Bärenreiter, Prague 2011

Four fortunate family circumstances were involved in the creation of this Sonata in d for alto recorder and organ: Hans Chemin-Petit originally wrote the middle movement of the sonata in 1963 for the christening of his grandson Hajo - a cheerful, idyllic aria in three-four time with a calm andante tempo at the beginning and end and a somewhat faster middle section. The fact that he composed for recorder at all in the first half of the 20th century is due to the fact that one of his daughters - Jeannette Chemin-Petit - was a recorder player, first as a pupil of Linde Höffer-von Winterfeld, then as a professor herself in Berlin. And the third fact can be found in Hans Chemin-Petit's own biography: Born in Potsdam in 1902, the son of a bandmaster and a singer, he enjoyed piano and cello lessons from an early age, later studied cello and composition at the Musikhochschule in Berlin and rose to prominence both as a cellist and choral conductor, but also as a composer. His extensive oeuvre encompasses almost all genres and includes numerous works for recorder, from small-scale house music to a large double concerto for recorder, harpsichord, strings and percussion. However, Chemin-Petit also had to put up with critical questions: As a member of the Nazi Altherrenbund, he was committed to an ideology that casts him, his works and his work in an ambivalent light. For example, his cantata To love performed at the Reichsmusiktag 1938.

Hans Chemin-Petit explores in his Sonata in d As in his works in general, he explores the boundaries of tonality, to which he always remains attached. His thinking is also formally indebted to tradition: Both the understanding of form based on symmetry, the artful polyphony trained on J. S. Bach, the type of rhythm and the movement models (aria, gigue) refer to baroque models, but have been given a new guise thanks to Chemin-Petit's very personal tonal language and melodic richness. The two instruments, alto recorder and organ, are equal partners in the dialog.

In the summer after the aforementioned baptism, the composer added the two outer movements Allegro and Gigue to the first Aria to create a three-movement sonata in the classical style. We have his second daughter (and mother of the christened child) Andrea Witte to thank for the fact that it was edited at all - stroke of luck number four.

Hans Chemin-Petit (1902-1981), Sonata in d for treble recorder and organ, edited by Andrea Witte, EM 2165, € 15.00, Edition Merseburger, Kassel 2013

In keeping with the Verdi year, the Swiss flautist Emmanuel Pahud has presented his Flute Collection with operatic fantasies based on his works, which were written in the 19th century for chamber music and house concerts. Due to Theobald Böhm's technical developments, a new generation of flautists emerged in the mid-19th century who used their virtuosity to dress popular music, such as the "opera hits" of the time, in effective paraphrases and fantasies. On the one hand, Pahud intends to bring these bravura pieces, some of which have fallen into oblivion, back to life in the original version for flute and piano, and on the other, he has recognized that they are also suitable as flute concertos, so he had Yoel Gamzou prepare an orchestral accompaniment for all the works.

With the Fantasy on "La Traviata" are the popular arrangements by the renowned Italian flautists Emanuele Krakamp and Giulio Briccialdi, both of whom were also active as composers. For the new edition, Yoel Gamzou has combined their two versions into one whole. The individual sections always begin with familiar themes, which are then soon lavishly embellished with garlands.

The Fantasy on "Rigoletto" for two flutes and piano was composed by the brothers Karl and Franz Doppler, who were internationally renowned as traveling flute virtuosos in the 19th century and probably performed this piece on their concert tours. The fantasy also contains the famous soprano aria Caro nome di lui si amatowhich in the opera is played by two flutes in the slow opening theme. The two flute parts are often skillfully led in sweet sixths and alternate with the theme and virtuoso orchestration, so that two equal instrumental parts face each other. This fantasy is also dynamically graded in an interesting way and therefore has a very colorful effect.

The processing of the Lensky's aria from Tchaikovsky's opera "Eugene Onegin", whose range extends from a low B to a four-note C, lives more from its expressive melody than from virtuoso passages. The version goes back to an arrangement from the 1920s by Leopold Auer for violin and piano and was revised and edited for flute and piano by Guy Braunstein, the current concertmaster of the Berliner Philharmoniker. This work now also enriches the repertoire for flutists.

Giuseppe Verdi , Fantasia on "La Traviata" for flute and piano after the fantasies by Emanuele Karakamp and Giulio Briccialdi arranged by Yoel Gamzou, (The Flute collection UE 35314, € 22.95, Universal Edition, Vienna 2012

Giuseppe Verdi/Franz and Karl Doppler, Fantasy on "Rigoletto" for two flutes and piano, UE 35315, € 24.95

Peter Ilyich Tsaikovsky, Lensky's aria from the opera "Eugene Onegin", arranged for flute and piano by Guy Braunstein, UE 35313, € 18.95

Originally, the Sound flowers was written for piano by the German composer Barbara Heller; she later arranged it for violin and piano. It turned out that both versions are for the most part also very suitable for harp or harp and violin. Domenica Reetz and Marianne Boettcher have arranged them accordingly.

The individual pieces have very pictorial titles, some with the names of flowers, others with fantasy names such as Fluttering flower, paper flower, grasses in the wind, ice flower etc. and thus enable a direct, associative reference to the various soundscapes. Depending on its character, each piece is based on a musical idea (a scale, a restriction to certain intervals, a musical gesture or a rhythmic element), which is able to radiate a strong mood and captivate players and listeners alike.

While the Sound flowers While the booklet for solo harp consists of 17 pieces, the booklet for violin and harp has 14 (and not 13, as incorrectly noted on the cover!). Some of the same pieces have been expanded or divided between the two instruments, and some new pieces have been added. The Klangblumen can be played as a cycle or individually. Both the solo and duo pieces are also ideal for young people, who will come into contact with very atmospheric music of our time and perhaps even be encouraged to experiment further with the musical ideas.

Some pieces can be played on the Celtic harp or the Tyrolean harp. Apart from a few incorrect pedal markings, the edition is beautifully and clearly laid out. I can warmly recommend these two works.

Barbara Heller: Klangblumen, 17 pieces for solo harp, edited by Domenica Reetz, ED 21020, € 11.99, Schott, Mainz 2011

Barbara Heller: Klangblumen, 13 pieces for violin and harp, edited by Marianne Boettcher, ED 21021, € 16.99, Schott, Mainz 2011

With around 900 square meters of sales space spread over two floors, the largest specialist store in Eastern Switzerland for acoustic grand and upright pianos, digital pianos, electronic music accessories and selected DJ and home studio equipment is to be built on Fürstenlandstrasse in St. Gallen.

In the last five years, there has been a massive shift in the sale of sound carriers in particular towards online sources, writes Musik Hug. For this reason, the webshop with over 350,000 sheet music and music books is being fundamentally revised. Soon, around 400,000 classical, jazz and pop/rock CDs, special instrumental offers and accessories will also be available online.

The closure of the St. Gallen Musik Hug branch as a result of the restructuring may lead to a reduction of 11 to 14 jobs, which will be accompanied by a redundancy plan. The affected employees and apprentices in particular will be offered a new position in the full-range stores if possible.

According to the French-speaking Swiss newspaper "Le Temps", the orchestra's management has circulated a letter within the orchestra announcing the court settlement. No details of the agreement are being made public.

Originally, Esteban was owed 1.8 million francs by the OSR. Esteban was dismissed in 2012 shortly after taking office for unknown reasons