Balkan Mosaïk

A compilation of nine miniatures written for the first volume of a violin school (op. 26 I), and which exists in a total of five different versions. From a "Dance of Koldunian warlocks" to a "Night music of the Smyrnian smugglers" to "Dracula’s love dance," this compilation also reflects our own Central Western European ideas about the Balkans. Each of these versions is individually elaborated in its own way. They present variants of the material of the selected violin duets, differ in length and content, sometimes considerably, and undergo harmonic metamorphoses, formal rearrangements, complex contrapuntal progressions and rhythmically structural clarifications. The version for string orchestra was written for the Viennese Kreislerensemble.