Drei Liebeslieder

The Drei Liebeslieder occupy an important position in Heinz Holliger’s compositional output as the first of two song cycles devoted to the poetry of Georg Trackl. Holliger considered this as his first official composition: quasi as his Opus 1. The world première of this work in 1962 was also significant as being his first orchestral composition. Holliger later returned to Trackl’s poetry and selected the same instrumentation for a further song cycle: the Fünf Lieder were composed between 1992 and 2006. As a young man, Holliger was able to identify himself with Trackl’s lyrical and expressive poetic language, whereas his later relationship to the poet’s texts appears distinctly more reserved.