Clemens Merkel

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Maderna, von Schweinitz, Beuger, Stiegler
Order Reference:	EWR 9606
Medium:	CD
Composers:	Violine Beuger / Maderna / Stiegler / von Schweinitz
Performers:	Clemens Merkel,
For Wolfgang von Schweinitz composing grows out of a strong wish ,,to fight his way into song." This desire is already governing his early ,,Sonata for Violin Solo", wriften in 1978.The reacquaintance with this piece, which had only been played once before, was a happy event for Wolfgang von Schweinitz. ,,Although stylistically I have gone a very different direction, it was fascinating for me to see that what I am seeking now was already guiding my work at that time. Clemens Merkel has not only reanimated the piece, in his interpretation he has found its true tempo, and its own space and time."
In Bruno Madernas case, music seems to spring from the realm of dance. Dance suggests freedom: lightness wrested from gravity. Madernas ,,Pièce pour lvry" sings and dances in a stunningly light and delicate way. lt is music of a most immediate pulse. A music of the skin. A music of the surface and of the air.
,,Unwritten Page" by Antoine Beuger is dedicated to the American painter Agnes Martin. lt is a music of individual sounds: a very slow and aimless wandering, and then, once and awhile, a pause.
In his cycle ,,Kammerkomplex" (,,quasi una fantasia", "gran partita" and ,,sonata facile"), Thomas Stiegler approaches the instrument as if discovered for the first time. ,,If you conceive of the instrument as a Iandscape," the composer says, ,,you find yourself confronted with a given infrastructure, a texture of possible routes: some predictable, some bumpy and some wildly overgrown." In this landscape the pieces, as it were, explore various routes, learning the way as they go.