Erstaunen und Widersprüchlichkeit: Tendenzen kultureller Entgrenzung in der Musik von Hans Zender

In Hans Zender’s oeuvre manifold traces of an intense confrontation with intercultural questions can be found. More specifically, many of Zender’s works relate to East Asian cultures. Generally, Zender highlights heterogeneity and his concepts of interculturality seem to be opposed to a hybrid mixture of idioms as described by the term »creolisation«. Most recently Zender’s opera Chief Joseph (2001-2003), a complex work about cultural conflict, oscillated between familiarity and strangeness, between descriptive and cryptic layers. Zender has referred to the ancient Chinese magical square luo shu and to ancient Chinese theories of tuning to widen eurocentric discourses of contemporary music, although the references in his scores can often hardly be labelled specifically »Asian«. On a similar conceptual level, three main traditions from East Asian philosophy have had substantial influences on him, namely: the anti-logocentric ideas of Zen-Buddhism (obviously partly triggered by John Cage), the Confucian ideals of music set forth in the ancient »Book of Rites« Liji, and the philosophers of the Kyoto-School – mainly Kitaro Nishida and his idea of »pure experience«. Zender’s works such as Fünf Haiku (1982) or Lo-Shu VI (1989) exemplify the composer’s transformation of traditional Japanese aesthetics into forms of obvious simplicity that establish a continuous change between uninterrupted flow and sudden silence. The notion of a »dissolution of time« is present in these pieces as well as in the earlier Muji no kyo (1975) which, conversely, ends in an intensification of the musical structure on all levels. Likewise, Furin no kyo (1989) and Nanzen no kyo (1992) superimpose different concepts of time associated with different cultures. In the final section of Furin no kyo the superimposition of different concepts of time and languages results in a collage-like microstructure. These examples confirm that Zender’s aesthetic focuses on contradiction and does not aim to harmonise cultural differences or conflicts. For Hans Zender interculturality means a fundamental »concussion of [established] meanings« (Roland Barthes)

Sprechen durch Musik im Komponieren der Gegenwart: Podiumsdiskussion mit Clemens Gadenstätter, Susanne Kogler, Albrecht Wellmer, Diskussionsleitung: Jörn Peter Hiekel

Commenting on a performance of two musical works that were played as the starting point for this discussion – Anton Webern’s Drei kleine Stücke (1914) for violoncello and piano op. 11 and Helmut Lachenmann’s Ein Kinderspiel (1980) for piano – Jörn Peter Hiekel observes that speaking about music and speaking through music particularly condition one another in new music. Both Webern and Lachenmann, by different compositional means, condense familiar musical gestures until they turn into a »language of their own«. In Lachenmann’s work, which refers to well-known children songs, this process is closely connected to what Albrecht Wellmer has called »wordliness« (Welthaltigkeit). More generally, the serialist »rebellion against music’s resemblance to language« (Adorno) shows a paradoxical twist towards sedimentation in the form of a new emerging language, as Clemens Gadenstätter explains with reference to Karlheinz Stockhausen’s Gruppen (1955–56). In new music musical idioms have been thoroughly destabilized yet always re-contextualized within established formulae. The panellists agree on a notion of both language and music that is not conceived as a closed system, but rather a network of relations transformed in time. Hence no distinct boundary can be drawn between syntax and semantics in music, nor is there any musical language that communicates a universal meaning (despite Joseph Haydn’s claim to the contrary). In addition – as anecdotes from Luigi Nono and Helmut Lachenmann document – the ambiguity of musical meaning is also relevant for composers who might be (favourably) surprised by unorthodox performances of their works that seemingly contradict the composers’ intentions, but in fact contribute to unfolding the multiplicity of meanings in a work

Interkulturelle Begegnung als existentielles Risiko: Ästhetische, historische und gesellschaftliche Aspekte musikalischer Globalisierung

The panel discussion first focuses on the obvious gap between a relatively optimistic perspective on musical globalisation, mainly in view of non-Western popular musics, as a main trend in today’s ethnomusicology and the description of intercultural musical encounter as a difficult, lengthy and self-challenging process as suggested by Hans Zender and most examples from contemporary art music. Gerd Grupe emphasizes that non-Western popular musics include both forms that even out cultural differences by following Western commercial standards and, contrarily, forms that are highly dependent on local lingual or musical codes and thus cannot be transferred to an international realm. To illustrate the »existential« approach of art music composers, Zender quotes the case of Giacinto Scelsi whose music has received a profound influence from Tibetan music. Zender emphasizes that Scelsi has created – after a long period of crisis – a »Third Way« that can be understood from neither a purely European, nor a purely Tibetan perspective. The discussion then centres on the question of which influence Western concepts of history and the dynamics of »progress« have exerted on different traditional and contemporary forms of the world’s musics and to what extent the post-colonial polarisation of a »dynamic« Western culture and »static« non-Western cultures is still virulent in the discussion of these musics today. While Christian Utz emphasizes that many non-Western traditions that were deemed to have been preserved unchanged for many centuries for example the Japanese court music gagaku – have in fact changed considerably over the centuries and have been highly influenced by political and social changes, Peter Revers traces the idea of »making history« back to Friedrich Schlegel and describes it as very influential on the dynamics of Western music history. Andreas Dorschel raises the question, if early 20th century »national« schools and in particular the music of Béla Bartók and Leoš Janáek can be seen as forerunners of trends in non-Western contemporary music that accentuate cultural difference. Christian Utz remarks that despite the fact that the music of Bartók has been a very important model for Asian composers in the process of creating a music independent of Romanticist symphonic clichés, elements of (neo-)nationalism in Bartók’s concept of music make it hard to see it as a model for a new music free of nationalist bias. Responding to a question from the audience, Andreas Dorschel summarizes that turning to music or art of other cultures might indeed be a signal for »weak« moments within a culture, but in turn this »weakness« proves the inner strength to challenge one’s own culture’s fundamental principles whereas discrimination and xenophobia are based on a very different kind of inner weakness where one is merely unable or unwilling to confront the Other

Erstaunen und Widersprüchlichkeit: Tendenzen kultureller Entgrenzung in der Musik von Hans Zender

In Hans Zender’s oeuvre manifold traces of an intense confrontation with intercultural questions can be found. More specifically, many of Zender’s works relate to East Asian cultures. Generally, Zender highlights heterogeneity and his concepts of interculturality seem to be opposed to a hybrid mixture of idioms as described by the term »creolisation«. Most recently Zender’s opera Chief Joseph (2001-2003), a complex work about cultural conflict, oscillated between familiarity and strangeness, between descriptive and cryptic layers. Zender has referred to the ancient Chinese magical square luo shu and to ancient Chinese theories of tuning to widen eurocentric discourses of contemporary music, although the references in his scores can often hardly be labelled specifically »Asian«. On a similar conceptual level, three main traditions from East Asian philosophy have had substantial influences on him, namely: the anti-logocentric ideas of Zen-Buddhism (obviously partly triggered by John Cage), the Confucian ideals of music set forth in the ancient »Book of Rites« Liji, and the philosophers of the Kyoto-School – mainly Kitaro Nishida and his idea of »pure experience«. Zender’s works such as Fünf Haiku (1982) or Lo-Shu VI (1989) exemplify the composer’s transformation of traditional Japanese aesthetics into forms of obvious simplicity that establish a continuous change between uninterrupted flow and sudden silence. The notion of a »dissolution of time« is present in these pieces as well as in the earlier Muji no kyo (1975) which, conversely, ends in an intensification of the musical structure on all levels. Likewise, Furin no kyo (1989) and Nanzen no kyo (1992) superimpose different concepts of time associated with different cultures. In the final section of Furin no kyo the superimposition of different concepts of time and languages results in a collage-like microstructure. These examples confirm that Zender’s aesthetic focuses on contradiction and does not aim to harmonise cultural differences or conflicts. For Hans Zender interculturality means a fundamental »concussion of [established] meanings« (Roland Barthes)

Erstaunen und Widersprüchlichkeit: Tendenzen kultureller Entgrenzung in der Musik von Hans Zender

In Hans Zender’s oeuvre manifold traces of an intense confrontation with intercultural questions can be found. More specifically, many of Zender’s works relate to East Asian cultures. Generally, Zender highlights heterogeneity and his concepts of interculturality seem to be opposed to a hybrid mixture of idioms as described by the term »creolisation«. Most recently Zender’s opera Chief Joseph (2001-2003), a complex work about cultural conflict, oscillated between familiarity and strangeness, between descriptive and cryptic layers. Zender has referred to the ancient Chinese magical square luo shu and to ancient Chinese theories of tuning to widen eurocentric discourses of contemporary music, although the references in his scores can often hardly be labelled specifically »Asian«. On a similar conceptual level, three main traditions from East Asian philosophy have had substantial influences on him, namely: the anti-logocentric ideas of Zen-Buddhism (obviously partly triggered by John Cage), the Confucian ideals of music set forth in the ancient »Book of Rites« Liji, and the philosophers of the Kyoto-School – mainly Kitaro Nishida and his idea of »pure experience«. Zender’s works such as Fünf Haiku (1982) or Lo-Shu VI (1989) exemplify the composer’s transformation of traditional Japanese aesthetics into forms of obvious simplicity that establish a continuous change between uninterrupted flow and sudden silence. The notion of a »dissolution of time« is present in these pieces as well as in the earlier Muji no kyo (1975) which, conversely, ends in an intensification of the musical structure on all levels. Likewise, Furin no kyo (1989) and Nanzen no kyo (1992) superimpose different concepts of time associated with different cultures. In the final section of Furin no kyo the superimposition of different concepts of time and languages results in a collage-like microstructure. These examples confirm that Zender’s aesthetic focuses on contradiction and does not aim to harmonise cultural differences or conflicts. For Hans Zender interculturality means a fundamental »concussion of [established] meanings« (Roland Barthes)

Les écrits de Hans Zender

Hans Zender fait partie des personnalités de la vie musicale contemporaine qui combinent de façon convaincante plusieurs activités créatrices. S’il assure depuis longtemps la double fonction de compositeur et de chef d’orchestre, il faut souligner que son écriture profite depuis plus de quatre décennies d’une connaissance approfondie de ce qu’on nomme généralement le « métier » ; dans son cas, cette expérience porte sur toutes les formes instrumentales et vocales du domaine contemporain. À cô..

Unité – Pluralité. La Musique de Hans Zender: Actes du colloque de Strasbourg 2012

International audienceLe compositeur Hans Zender (né en 1936) occupe une place importante dans la culture allemande depuis les années 1970 en tant que chef d'orchestre, directeur d’opéra et pédagogue (il a enseigné la composition de 1988 à 2000 à la Musikhochschule de Francfort). En tant que compositeur il a écrit des œuvres dans différents genres (opéras, musique orchestrale, musique de chambre, musique vocale, etc.), s’intéressant particulièrement à l’Extrême-Orient, à des « interprétations composées » comme dans sa Schuberts « Winterreise », ou à certains grands poètes (dans le cycle Hölderlin lesen par exemple). Ce premier ouvrage en français consacré à ce grand compositeur est issu d’un colloque organisé par Pierre Michel et Jörn Peter Hiekel à Strasbourg en 2012 dans le cadre de l’Université de Strasbourg et du Festival Musica, il aborde diverses facettes de son œuvre et de sa pensée grâce à des spécialistes de plusieurs disciplines dont la musicologie et la littérature comparée.Contributeurs : Class Olivier, Froidefond Marik, Hiekel Jörn Peter, Michel Pierre, Mosch Ulrich, Mundry Isabel, Nubel Jonathan, Soraru Isabelle, Staiber Maryse, Strinz Werner, Zenck Marti

Sprechen durch Musik im Komponieren der Gegenwart: Podiumsdiskussion mit Clemens Gadenstätter, Susanne Kogler, Albrecht Wellmer, Diskussionsleitung: Jörn Peter Hiekel

Commenting on a performance of two musical works that were played as the starting point for this discussion – Anton Webern’s Drei kleine Stücke (1914) for violoncello and piano op. 11 and Helmut Lachenmann’s Ein Kinderspiel (1980) for piano – Jörn Peter Hiekel observes that speaking about music and speaking through music particularly condition one another in new music. Both Webern and Lachenmann, by different compositional means, condense familiar musical gestures until they turn into a »language of their own«. In Lachenmann’s work, which refers to well-known children songs, this process is closely connected to what Albrecht Wellmer has called »wordliness« (Welthaltigkeit). More generally, the serialist »rebellion against music’s resemblance to language« (Adorno) shows a paradoxical twist towards sedimentation in the form of a new emerging language, as Clemens Gadenstätter explains with reference to Karlheinz Stockhausen’s Gruppen (1955–56). In new music musical idioms have been thoroughly destabilized yet always re-contextualized within established formulae. The panellists agree on a notion of both language and music that is not conceived as a closed system, but rather a network of relations transformed in time. Hence no distinct boundary can be drawn between syntax and semantics in music, nor is there any musical language that communicates a universal meaning (despite Joseph Haydn’s claim to the contrary). In addition – as anecdotes from Luigi Nono and Helmut Lachenmann document – the ambiguity of musical meaning is also relevant for composers who might be (favourably) surprised by unorthodox performances of their works that seemingly contradict the composers’ intentions, but in fact contribute to unfolding the multiplicity of meanings in a work

Essais sur la musique

Hans Zender, né en 1936, est l’une des figures les plus importantes de la culture allemande. Compositeur, chef d’orchestre, pédagogue et penseur, il est depuis les années 1960 aux avant-postes de la musique nouvelle, tout en poursuivant de façon inlassable un dialogue créatif avec le passé, marqué notamment par ses lectures critiques d’œuvres comme le Voyage d’hiver de Schubert ou les Variations Diabelli de Beethoven, qu’il désigne du terme d’« interprétations composées ». Le choix d’essais que nous publions ici pour la première fois en français couvre quarante ans de réflexion sur la musique. Zender y interroge la musique actuelle comme celle du passé, les questions compositionnelles comme celles liées à l’interprétation. Sa pensée, d’un bout à l’autre, est traversée par des références multiples et par le souci des conditions mêmes de la musique dans la société actuelle. Hors des sentiers battus, Zender a fait le pari de ce que Bernd Alois Zimmermann appelait le pluralisme ; ainsi se penche-t-il sur des démarches apparemment antinomiques, comme celles de Mahler et de Cage, de Bruckner et de Scelsi, de Messiaen, d’Earle Brown et de Lachenmann. Ce qui les réunit, tout en englobant l’auteur lui-même, est une radicalité et une indépendance d’esprit qui se doublent d’une exigence spirituelle et d’un goût pour l’exploration de mondes sonores nouveaux. De même, Hans Zender a été profondément marqué par la pensée extrême-orientale, dont ses œuvres portent des traces multiples. L’ensemble de ses essais, rassemblés ici par Pierre Michel et traduits par Martin Kaltenecker et par Maryse Staiber, portent un regard neuf et stimulant sur les musiques d’hier et d’aujourd’hui

Sprechen durch Musik im Komponieren der Gegenwart: Podiumsdiskussion mit Clemens Gadenstätter, Susanne Kogler, Albrecht Wellmer, Diskussionsleitung: Jörn Peter Hiekel

Commenting on a performance of two musical works that were played as the starting point for this discussion – Anton Webern’s Drei kleine Stücke (1914) for violoncello and piano op. 11 and Helmut Lachenmann’s Ein Kinderspiel (1980) for piano – Jörn Peter Hiekel observes that speaking about music and speaking through music particularly condition one another in new music. Both Webern and Lachenmann, by different compositional means, condense familiar musical gestures until they turn into a »language of their own«. In Lachenmann’s work, which refers to well-known children songs, this process is closely connected to what Albrecht Wellmer has called »wordliness« (Welthaltigkeit). More generally, the serialist »rebellion against music’s resemblance to language« (Adorno) shows a paradoxical twist towards sedimentation in the form of a new emerging language, as Clemens Gadenstätter explains with reference to Karlheinz Stockhausen’s Gruppen (1955–56). In new music musical idioms have been thoroughly destabilized yet always re-contextualized within established formulae. The panellists agree on a notion of both language and music that is not conceived as a closed system, but rather a network of relations transformed in time. Hence no distinct boundary can be drawn between syntax and semantics in music, nor is there any musical language that communicates a universal meaning (despite Joseph Haydn’s claim to the contrary). In addition – as anecdotes from Luigi Nono and Helmut Lachenmann document – the ambiguity of musical meaning is also relevant for composers who might be (favourably) surprised by unorthodox performances of their works that seemingly contradict the composers’ intentions, but in fact contribute to unfolding the multiplicity of meanings in a work