Biography

W O R L D   P R E M I E R E
February 10th 2011 – Hamburg Laeiszhalle - Großer Saal NDR Sinfonieorchester –
dir. Christoph Eschenbach.


N O T E S
These six orchestral pieces, composed during the summer of 2010 in response to a commission from the NDR for the Mahler Year, are to be understood as a "second glance" at musical shapes that have influenced me in experiencing Mahler's music. They are momentary approximations that I have "inscribed" in my own music.


They radiate impulses into the musical language of the pieces. Throughout, it is those incomparable moments of breakthrough that have made a profound and indelible
 
impression in my musical consciousness. They can be located as second-long traces from the Sixth, Seventh, Ninth and Tenth Symphonies.


These shapes disintegrate again at once, but they continue to effect my music below the surface.


During the composition of EINSCHREIBUNG I experienced a self-observation : the music looks forward in the moment during which it sounds - and likewise backward. Sound areas arise that move between identification and an indefinite, non-identical quality - as in a constant alternation between convergence and distance.
(Peter Ruzicka, December 2010)

 

Born July 3rd, 1948, in Düsseldorf, Peter Ruzicka studied piano, oboe and counterpoint at the Conservatory of Hamburg from 1963 to 1968 and then composition with Hans Werner Henze in Rome and Otte in Bremen. He is intendant of the Radio Symphony Orchestra of Berlin from 1979 to 1988 and the Hamburg Opera from 1988 until 1997. In 1985 he became a member of the Bavarian Academy of beaux-arts. In 1996 he succeeded Hans Werner Henze as artistic director of the Munich Biennale.

His catalog, rich with some fifty works, is mainly comprised of orchestral music (Antifone, 1970 In processo di tempo, 1971; Befragung, 1974; Satyagraha, 1984; Metamorphosen über ein klangfeld von Joseph Haydn, 1990; Vorgefühle, 1998...), vocal music (Esta Noche, 1967; Gestalt und Abbruch, 1979, Der die Gesänge zerschlug 1985; Vier Gesänge nach Fragmenten von Nietzsche, 1992), chamber music (four string quartets; Stress for eight groups of percussion, 1972...) and compositions for solo instruments (Sonata per violoncello, 1969; Zeit piece for organ, 1975; Preludes, six pieces for piano, 1987).

In addition, Peter Ruzicka has written numerous books and articles devoted to musicology four of which are consecrated to Gustav Mahler.

The early compositions of Peter Ruzicka are influenced by Henze, Ligeti and Stockhausen. As from Fragment (1970), we can detect the influences of Mahler and Webern.

From 1985, notably with Stele für Paul Celan, Ruzicka frees himself from all influence, even if he keeps a strong affinity with Mahler.

All his music is built on a dialectic of opposites: communication / silence, creation / destruction, past / future, art / thought... The themes of death and pain, central to the composer's work, are present in his earliest compositions: Esta Noche, funeral march for the victims of the Vietnam War, or in a different style, Die Sonne sinkt (Le soleil décroît, 1998), six songs from fragments of Friedrich Nietzsche for mezzo-soprano (or baritone) and orchestra.

In 1999 he composed his opera Celan which he tranformed into symphonic form in 2003 - Celan-Symphony - composed of 10 "parts" which all refer to seven different "tableaux" (Entwürfen: lineaments) of opera.

NOTICE

Vorecho ("préécho"), a symphonic study for a large orchestra, was created on February 22nd, 2006 in Madrid by the Madrid Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Cristobal Halffter. This orchestral piece is a symphonic study relative to his opera Hölderlin which was created in 2008 in Berlin. Through eight sketches, Ruzicka develops the basic sounds and musical gestures that will later focus on dramatical scenes and developments.

Duration: about 27 minutes.