Neun Stücke

As with the song cycle Eingedunkelt for mezzo soprano solo which was premiered in 1993, Aribert Reimann’s Neun Stücke für Orchester too have been influenced by the literary œuvre of Paul Celan. But while the poems in Eingedunkelt determine both content and expression of the songs, for the aphoristic orchestral miniatures they are nothing but a ‘signal’; Celan’s poetry fades in importance in favour of a purely musical world: ‘... the pieces speak for themselves’.

In Neun Stücke Reimann establishes subtle correlations between language and music; the pictorial quality of his static and at the same time inwardly circling music with its eruptive language, the associative linking of contrasting figures and the sudden silence form meaningful ciphers of grief and sorrow, giving the work the air of inevitability and finality.