27th – 29th of April 2012:
This weekend musicians and music lovers from all around the world will gather in the Germany city of Witten for a three-day international festival full of contemporary music – music that has literally never been heard before.
Since 1969, the festival Witten Days for New Chamber Music constantly sets the mark for new tendencies in contemporary music and serves as a meeting point for avant-garde music, as well as for fair organizers and publishers, for connoisseurs and music lovers. For the past four decades many important musical works have been heard in Witten for the very first time – works that have become an essential part of modern music history. Althogether Witten has premiered over 600 works that have ever since been repeatedly performed around the world. This year’s program offers no less than 23 world premieres and six German premieres by composers from eleven countries.
The composer-portrait is dedicated to the Danish composer Hans Abrahamsen, who was born in 1952 in Copenhagen. In addition to his new 4th String Quartet – several compositions will be performed in Germany for the first time. One of the highlights of the festival will be the string quartet summit, which will unite the London Arditti Quartet with the New York JACK Quartet to a double quartet. Besides new quartet compositions by Hans Abrahamsen, Naomi Pinnock, Simon Steen-Andersen and Walter Zimmermann, the program holds two new double quartets by James Clarke and Mauro Lanza.
More than ever, the festival will be strongly influenced by promising new composer talents. Among the newcomers Anne Cleare (1983, IE) Mark Barden (1980, USA), Simon Steen-Andersen (1976, DK), Stefan Wirth (1975, CH), Marco Nikodijevic (1980,RS), Ørjan Matre (1979, NO), Brigitta Muntendorf (1980, D), Mauro Lanza (1975, I), Naomi Pinnock (1979, GB) and James Clarke (1957, GB), Austria will also be represented by our brilliant composer Klaus Lang (1971). As a master of quiet, ever-changing sound worlds, Klang Lang is known for sweeping the audience off its feets and taking it on acoustic journeys that lead to the outer limits of sonic perception. This year, visitors of the festival will be able to experience the world premiere of his new composition “vier linien. zweifaches weiß” for winds, piano and percussion.
As always, all performances will be broadcasted live by the West German Broadcasting Company WDR, starting with a live broadcast on the 27th of April 2012 from 8.00 – 10.30 p.m.
Since mica – music austria has been fostering the young comtemporary music scene for quite some time now, the Austrian music information center will also be present at the festival to share more information on further aspiring and exciting young composers from Austria.