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Johannes Maria Staud's Apeiron Sees US Premiere by The Cleveland Orchestra

Jan. 31, 2008

Music Director Franz Welser-Möst has named Austrian composer Johannes Maria Staud as the Orchestra's Daniel R. Lewis Young Composer Fellow for the 2007-08 and 2008-09 seasons. Franz Welser-Möst will conduct the US premiere of Mr. Staud's Apeiron on Thursday, February 28, a piece inspired by the work of Leonardo da Vinci. The composer elaborates:

Anyone who engages in a detailed study of the work and artistic theories of Leonardo da Vinci is made aware how successfully this artist was able to integrate two worlds: the worlds of scientific, analytical thinking and of the inspired, poetic desire for expression. For him, the fact that both of these coexisted indivisibly was equally clear as the fact that neither could exist without the other, since on a higher level they constituted a unity.

The complete work, scored for 101 players, consists of six large sections of sometimes very diverse duration. It moves from quiet repose to orgiastic ecstasy, from concertante passages of chamber music character to sections using block scoring, which in their turn are succeeded by dense passages characterized by polyphony or timbral mixtures, sections that strive inexorably forward, or sections of near silence.

As a concert preview, Staud will appear as guest speaker for a conversation with The Cleveland Orchestra's Artistic Administrator Frank Dans. The run of Apeiron in Cleveland continues on Saturday, March 1 and Sunday, March 2. A new work by Mr. Staud will also be given its world premiere under Franz Welser-Möst's direction during the 2008-09 season. The work has been commissioned by The Cleveland Orchestra through the Young Composers Fund, endowed by Jan R. and Daniel R. Lewis.

More information on the music of Johannes Maria Staud can be found at www.universaledition.com.

For precise ticketing information, visit www.clevelandorchestra.com.

Johannes Maria Staud
Apeiron-Music for Large Orchestra (2004/2005)
4454-6441-6perc-pno.2hp-str(16.14.12.10.8)
20'

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