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2014 Wien Modern Festival Celebrates Georg Friedrich Haas

Oct. 30, 2014

2014 Wien Modern Festival Celebrates Georg Friedrich Haas

Georg Friedrich Haas is the featured composer at the 2014 Wien Modern Festival, with numerous performances scheduled throughout the month. The Festival’s opening concert, which took place on October 29, featured Haas’s concerto grosso Nr. 2 for chamber ensemble and orchestra, with Cornelius Meister leading Klangforum Wien and the ORF Radio-Symphonieorchester Wien.

On October 30, Klangforum Wien delivered an all-Haas chamber program, including flow and friction for a sixteenth-tone piano for four hands, de terrae fine for solo violin, and “… Schatten … durch unausdenkliche Wälder” for two pianos and two percussionists.  On November 2, François-Xavier Roth led the SWR Symphony Orchestra Baden-Baden and Freiburg in a rare performance of limited approximations for six microtonal pianos and orchestra. Haas remarks on the piece:

limited approximations does not tell a story. As with all my compositions, there is also no formal development or traditional formal structure. Contrasting elements alternate with one another – moments of smoothness and friction. “Pseudo-glissandi” in the pianos arrive unexpectedly at overtone chords. Apparently stable constellations of intervals begin to falter as the twelfth-tones merge. The spectral, telescoping chords of the pianos are taken up by the orchestra, over and over again. In my early works I had to limit myself to a few basic tones, out of respect for what was practically realizable … [i]n limited approximations, thanks to the pianos, the whole world of sound is open to me.

Additional performances include tria ex uno by œnm (Austrian Ensemble for Contemporary Music) on November 3, concerto grosso Nr. 1 with Peter Rundel conducting the hornroh alphorn quartet and the ORF Radio-Symphonieorchester Wien on November 4, AUS.WEG on November 17 with Ensemble Kontrapunkte led by Peter Keuschnig, and an historic performance of all eight string quartets by the Arditti Quartet over the course of four concerts between November 10 and 11. 

On November 8, the JACK Quartet performs Haas's String Quartet No. 3 "In iij. Noct" at Boston's Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA). The work, which received its US premiere at Lincoln Center in November 2013, is to be performed from memory in complete darkness with the musicians spaced as far away from one another as possible.  

Complete program details can be found at wienmodern.at and icaboston.org.

For more information on Georg Friedrich Haas, please visit universaledition.com.

Georg Friedrich Haas
concerto grosso No. 1 (2014)
for alphorn quartet and orchestra
3.3.3.3-6.3.3.1-timp.3perc-str
30’ 

Concerto Grosso No. 2 (2012-2013)
for chamber ensemble and orchestra
chamber ensemble: 1(pic).1.1.1-1.1.1.0-perc-pno.acc-str(1.1.1.1.1)
orchestra: 2.2.2.2-3.2.2.1-timp.3perc-str
22'

flow and friction (2001)
a small study for a sixteenth-tone piano for 4 hands
9’ 

de terrae fine (2001)
for solo violin
17’ 

“… Schatten … durch unausdenkliche Wälder” (1992)
for 2 pianos and 2 percussionists
24’

limited approximations (2010)
for 6 microtonally tuned pianos and orchestra
4.1.4.1-6.1.4.0-6pno-str(10.10.6.6.8)
30’ 

tria ex uno (2001)
for sextet
fl.cl.perc.pno.vn.vc
12’ 

AUS.WEG (2010)
for eight instruments
flute, baritone oboe, bass clarinet, percussion, piano, violin, viola, cello
19’ 

String Quartet No. 1 (1997)
30’

String Quartet No. 2 (1998)
18’

String Quartet No. 3 “In iij. Noct.” (2001)
50’

String Quartet No. 4 (2003)
for string quartet and live-electronics

String Quartet No. 5 (2007)
22’

String Quartet No. 6 (2010)
20’

String Quartet No. 7 (2011)
for string quartet and electronics
25’

String Quartet No. 8 (2014)
22’

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