Heinz Holliger: 70th Birthday

"My entire relation to music is such that I always try to go to the limits", Heinz Holliger once said. The ever restless Swiss composer, oboist and internationally acknowledged conductor turns 70 on 21 May. After studying composition with Sándor Veress and Pierre Boulez, Holliger found a truly personal language which includes extreme tonal areas and touches on existential experiences. His compositional oeuvre covers all genres, from stage works via orchestral, solo and chamber music works to many vocal compositions.

Numerous works such as Beiseit, the Scardanelli Cycle, Glühende Rätsel or the opera Snow White testify to Holliger’s special relation to literature, especially to authors such as Samuel Beckett or to the poetry of Robert Walser, Friedrich Hölderlin, Nelly Sachs and Georg Trakl. Among composers, it is primarily Robert Schumann whose life and work inspired many a work by Holliger; Gesänge der Frühe and Romancendres refer to Schumann’s music. In several compositions such as Alb-Cher, Puneigä or the new choir cycle for Lucerne Festival 2009 Rosa Loui Holliger also pays deference to the language and culture of his home country.

Holliger has received many awards and prizes, including the Frankfurt Musik Award 1988, the Ernst von Siemens Music Award 1991, the Prix de Composition Musicale de la Fondation Prince Pierre de Monaco 1994, the Zurich Festival Award 2007 as well as the Rheingau Music Award 2008.

On occasion of the 70th birthday ECM has released the world premiere recording Romancendres and Gesänge der Frühe.
 

• Heinz Holliger - Profile
• New CD with ECM
• High-resolution photo by Dániel Vass
• Recent Composer Brochure

 
New Publications:

• a reedy Double (a double reading for Doublereeder) from: COncErto?
• Contrechant sur le nom de Baudelaire for clarinet
• Contrechant sur le nom de Baudelaire, version for bass clarinet
• Rechant for clarinet
• Soli for violin from: COncErto?
• Souvenirs trémaësques for viola from: COncErto?
• Fantasiestück und Recitativo passionato for cello: COncErto?
• Flüsterfuge und Zirkelkanon for four celli (oe four bassoons) from: COncErto?