Reviews
Here you will find excerpts from reviews of performances of works by Gerd Kühr.
Eine Botschaft gegen die Armut der Fantasie (Klaus Oberrauner), KTZ, 24 January 2012
"Wenn der Tag den Ton bestimmt" Part 1 and Part 2 (pdf Download in German)
(Marianne Fischer), Kleine Zeitung, 21 January 2012
MUSIC AUSTRIA, 21 November 2011 (Heinz Rögl) – Extract
Gerd Kühr conducted the ensemble ‘die reihe’ performing British treatments of historical works, Cerha’s ‘Quellen’ [‘Sources’] and his own world premiere (‘Música Pura’).
... The idea to write a ‘pure music’ came to Kühr paradoxically during the performance of ‘Revue instrumentale et électronique’ [‘Instrumental and electronic music revue’], his sound space composition for the Grazer Musikprotokoll 2005. Gerd Kühr commented: ‘At that time, I had included a short movement, played by a trio alone, in my ‘Revue’ which also relied heavily on electronic passages when I had the idea to extract something from this combination in order to write a kind of ‘pure music’. This developed into five movements that are played in the same sequence. We will perform, together with my composition, Harrison Birtwistle’s interpretation of Guillaume de Machaut’s Hoquetus and Peter Maxwell Davies’ treatments of motets by old English composers. It is now possible to mix my ‘Musica pura’ with the scores by Maxwell Davies, movement by movement. This makes sense and works quite well as regards the contexts and harmonic transitions.
DER STANDARD, 24 November 2011 (Daniel Ender) – Extract
Highly Expressive Miniatures – Cerha, Kühr and Mitterer at Wien Modern
... Writing highly concentrated ‘pure’ music even today can work well as Gerd Kühr demonstrated at Schömer-Haus Klosterneuburg with the world premiere of his Música Pura. The five short movements, in which the composer conducted the ensemble ‘die reihe’, are extremely economical, while not being at all fragmented. They are mostly based on specific occurrences, but they always converge in meaningful connections.
NÖN, 21 March 2011 (Michaela Fleck) – Extract
Freshly Matured Texts and Sounds
LOISIARTE / For the sixth time Christian Altenburger invites to the Langenlois Loisium – to new music, old texts and fine guests
... Before and after that, however, something completely different is on the festival programme: beautiful words and fresh notes. This year they come from ‘Composer in Residence’ Gerd Kühr from Kärnten, the American Jon Deak, and Christof Ressi, the young man from Villach, and moreover from Franz Schubert, George Gershwin, Jean Sibelius and Edvard Grieg.
In addition, festival director Christian Altenburger invited actors of the Burgtheater and prominent authors such as Michael Köhlmeier, who reads from his most recent texts. Wolfram Berger, Maria Happel and Joachim Bissmeier bring work by Mark Twain, Isabel Allende and Halldór Laxness to Langenlois.
Zeit-Ton, http://oe1.orf.at/programm/269492, 15 March 2011 – Extract
Zeit-Ton
About the programme ‘Zeit-Ton’ – The composition competition ZEITklang.
Design: Ursula Strubinsky
... As part of the composition competition ZEITklang young European composers were invited to write new works for string quartets. A notable jury chaired by Gerhard Kühr selected the most outstanding works. On the 12th of March they had their world premiere at the Schömer-Haus in Klosterneuburg, performed by the ‘Kairos Quartett’. One could hear new string quartets by composers Juan Cruz-Guevara, Ansgar Beste, Nicolas Tzortzis, Martin Iddon and Roberto David Rusconi.
Kronen-Zeitung, 16 November 2010 (MW) – Extract
‘recreation’ at the Stefaniensaal in Graz: Composer at the Conductor’s Desk
At the Congress the orchestra ‘recreation’ dedicated itself to a harmonious package of New Music and Romanticism. Patricia Kopatchinskaja stood out in Gerd Kühr’s violin concerto from 2006; from the conductor’s desk the composer himself took care of an ideal interpretation. This he achieved also with two works for orchestra by Mendelssohn.
That as a contemporary musician Gerd Kühr hears ‘differently’, became clear when listening to the dying chord changes of the strings that open Mendelssohn’s concert overture ‘Meeresstille und glückliche Fahrt’ [‘Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage’].
Then the sails were blown blissfully, with animated freshness, which the Graz-born composer from Kärnten reproduced in the first movement of the ‘Italian’ symphony. In the middle movements Kühr was not satisfied with euphony. Here, transparency and a terrific lightness prevailed and a spirit of departure in the rapid finale.
The sensation of the evening was Kühr’s ‘Movimenti für Violine und Orchester’ [‘Movements for Violin and Orchestra]’: they simply took the concert pitch ‘a’ from tuning and made it their ‘theme’. All kinds of sound spectacles – flageolets, percussion, tremolos – narrated by Kopatchinskaja with staggering playfulness, condensed to a captivating entertainment, which did not need to be fully understood to be loved.
Kleine Zeitung, 16 November 2010 (Ernst Naredi-Rainer) – Extract
Gerd Kühr Conducts his Violin Concerto ‚Movimenti‘.
... So why does the orchestra tune its instruments only after the director already stepped to his desk? Because Gerd Kühr composed it that way, because he develops his violin concerto ‘Movimenti’, written in 2006 for Patricia Kopatchinskaja, from the concert pitch ‘a’. The next gag: the soloist remains invisible initially. Then her note breaks off from the tremolo of the strings and she, the object of dedication, approaches her dedicated space barefooted from behind the stage only to throw herself so violently into the solo passage that the bow flies out of her hand.
On Monday and Tuesday, Patricia Kopatchinskaja played in the Stefaniensaal the concerto that Kühr had tailored to her temperament with typical impulsiveness. Gerd Kühr, who had diligently prepared the dedicated ‘recreation’ orchestra for his delicate composition, conducted the piece, thus providing it with authenticity. In eleven parts, the concerto deals inventively with the tradition of the virtuosi while, in particular with its starting and final sounds of open strings, bowing to Alban Berg’s violin concerto. ...
Kleine Zeitung, 6 November 2010 (Herbert Schranz) – Auszug
‚Mystery and Complete Clarity‘
In its third edition ‚Styria Cantat‘ offered once more numerous commissioned works at an exhibition of Styrian choirs in two concerts at the ‘Mumuth’.
... The second concert was dominated by the Vocalforum and the Capella Nova Graz (Conductors: Franz M. Herzog and Otto Kargl respectively) with impressive works by Gerd Kühr and Beat Furrer. ‘No longer inhabitable’ it says at the end of ‘An die Musik I’ [‘To Music I’] by Kühr. As imaginative as this or Furrer’s memorable Leonardo set to music ‘Enigma IV’ are, one can indeed not ‘inhabit’ them comfortably. ...
... ‘An die Musik II’ by Kühr is an impressively clear musical representation of a transcendental poem by Detlev von Liliencron (1844-1909). ...
Kleine Zeitung, 19 September 2010 (Ernst Naredi-Rainer)
‚Crystal Clear Sensitivity and Renunciation to Threatening Pathos’
‘At the opening of the season, the Graz Opera celebrated the 60th anniversary of the Philharmonic Orchestra.’
... The evening opened with a modern work: ‘Eso Es’, composed in 1989 by Gerhard Kühr, whose Turrini settings ‘Tod und Teufel’ [‘Death and the Devil’] had opened the Graz Opera in 1999. The title refers to the note ‘es’ thereby also to the root harmony of the ‘Eroica’. ...
Kleine Zeitung, 8 August 2010
‘From the Tavern to the National Opera Ballet’
‘They played real folk music, but at the highest of levels. From there it is a stone’s throw to classical music.’
... This year composer Gerd Kühr composed a piece for the five ‘Bradlmusiker’ [a type of folk musician], in which the sound patterns typical of Alpine folk music were artfully interpreted. ‘A real titbit’ Pressl gushes, who has remained grounded despite having performed with musical aristocracy on many occasions. ...
Kronen Zeitung (MG), 2 July 2010
‘Young Ones for the New’
‘Final concert at the Graz MUMUTH’
... The programme encompassed exclusively works from the ‘golden generation’ of the Graz school of composers: Georg Friedrich Haas’ ‘Monodie’ [‘Monody’], which is rooted in adventurous harmonies and glissandi; Bernhard Lang’s ‘DW 5’ that plays typically with an element of varied repetition; Gerd Kühr’s ‘stop and go and black and white’, which is so nuanced in terms of colour and dynamic...
Kleine Zeitung (by Ernst Naredi-Rainer), April 29, 2010
"In the sign of number nine"
"During the season 2010/2011, the recreation-orchestra Graz will celebrate the number nine in several ways. Obviously, in nine double concerts."
...Still without a musical director, the recreation-orchestra will perform in the coming season under conductors who are especially close to its heart: Michael Hofstetter, Gerd Kühr, Josep Caballé-Domenech, ...
Die Presse (by Irene Suchy), May 29, 2009
"The Guise in Which the Sun Competes"
"There is hardly an Austrian composer who has not composed en masse, a requiem, or a confessional-based choir work in recent years. What are they trying to tell us?"
… Ulf Schirmer who, as initiator of a "Magnificat" commissioned to Gerd Kühr, has experience with religious commissions and knows of the particular personal involvement, of the exploration of spirituality and emotionality in rejection and reception. To compose a Magnificat also means for Gerd Kühr to include the composition story of the Magnificat in his composition. Kühr strives to create an autonomous composition for the space within the church, it should "behave" as he says in its religious surroundings, not comply with (more) guidelines from the initiator. The "Magnificat" is chosen by Kühr in cooperation with the initiator, because it is "more concrete" than the credo of a mass for instance: "very concrete, pictorial and spoken based on a concrete situation". Performed for the first time in 2008 as a work commissioned by the Bavarian Radio, four parts carry the title of the whole: "Introductio – Meditatio – Magnificat – Epilogus".
Kühr applies his orchestra in an umbral nature, for Schirmer a "composed stutter or doubt", also "the struggle with the material". Kühr gives his statement as an orchestra composer. When reading, as well as listening (the soprano has to cross limits of beauty), the material gives a "fully physical and questioning impression". …
Kleine Zeitung (online), May 28, 2009
"Four Composers Show Their "Opera of the Future" in Graz"
"Christiane Lutz stages four debut performances at the Graz Opera House"
This coming Friday (June 5), four young composers are putting their works up for discussion on the Studiobühne of the Graz Opera House. They are composition students of Gerd Kühr and Pierluigi Billone, who are demonstrating the possibilities of this genre in a wide variety of ways. The director is Christiane Lutz, who attempts to bring the various works to the stage as a harmonious whole. …
Wiener Zeitung (by Gerhard Kramer), March 26, 2009
"In the Service of New Music"
"50 years of ensemble "die reihe" – that is the changeful history of battles and victories for music creation of the 20th and 21st centuries."
… True to the program philosophy of the ensemble, the evening spanned the works of half a century. Brand-new, a work commissioned for the anniversary: "reihenweise" from Gerd Kühr, 12 works that with subtle traces of humor, offer a melodic summary of the past 50 years – punctual, serial, sound masses à la Ligeti. …
Kurier (opal), March 24, 2009
"Still a Joy Even after 50 Years"
"die reihe", whose important activities for contemporary music are not always appreciated, celebrated their 50th anniversary on Sunday in the Konzerthaus. Already the opening work commissioned by the formation, Gerd Kührs "reihenweise" (UA), was fitting for the event. In the 15-minute, skillfully arranged review of composition techniques from the past 50 years, Kühr worked deftly with noises, clusters, micro-intervals, unusual effects, etc. …
Die Presse (by Wilhelm Sinkovicz), March 23, 2009
"Konzerthaus: Dance and Lots of Fun on the Rubble"
Friedrich Cerha organized the anniversary concert for the "reihe" as a puzzle game of modern music.
… Gerd Kühr also belongs to the group of founders who above all understand our broad music to be a medium of entertainment and edification (even if highly intellectual). With ironic allusion to the twelve tones of the "reihe", he contributed 12 works for 12 musicians to the anniversary celebration, short and to the point, yet always telling a story with acoustic impressions (like Cerhas "Spiegel", yet en miniature), building upon formal structures that everyone who is willingly listening can easily decipher in order to also enjoy the punch lines that bring each of the short works to a close. New music that is fun, already at its debut performance! …
Kleine Zeitung (by Eva Schulz), February 13, 2009
"Youth Meet Avant-garde"
"Styria cantat" brought young choirs and composers together and impressed with 20 debut performances of contemporary choir works.
… That doesn't sound like anything. Gertrud Zwicker described the first confrontation of the youth with the avant-garde: "That doesn't sound like anything, it's difficult to sing, extremely difficult, strange", were her spontaneous comments. Renowned composers like Beat Furrer, Gerd Kühr, Klaus Lang, Bernhard Lang, Christian Muthspiel, Friedrich Cerha or Ivan Eröd had to accept such critique, and even darts were thrown at the picture of Wilhelm Spuller. During the course of the rehearsals together with the composers however, an appreciation, understanding and even growing enthusiasm began to form. The audience also shared this experience. ...
Kleine Zeitung (by Eva Schulz), January 5, 2009
"Styria cantat": Songs from Beyond Semmering
… move forward into the present. Of course there is always the dedicated choir leader who will attempt to push forward into the music of today. Yet the great idea that functions as a true multiplier requires a bundle of energy like district manager Gertrud Zwicker. In February 2007, she provided the first lasting stimulus with her project "Styria cantat". 15 renowned composers such as Beat Furrer, Gerd Kühr, Klaus Lang or Christian Muthspiel composed works for 15 Styrian children's and youth choirs. The joint debut performance in the List-Halle was an impressive success. …
Klassik.com (by Dr. Stefan Drees), October 23, 2008
"A Record for Independent Thinkers"
Patricia Kopatchinskaja plays: works for violin and orchestra by Kühr, Resch & Zykan
… By comparison, the "Movimenti" (2006) by Gerd Kühr (*1952) give a completely different impression with their constant breaks, after which likewise reminiscent fragments shine through. Not only the many twists and turns of the music are full of surprises, but the beginning itself was a surprise: namely when the listener realizes that the tuning of the orchestra has suddenly changed into the basis of a finely spun melody, above which the solo violin enters, floating on the highest tones, a process that is mirrored at the end of the composition in the tuning of the empty strings of the solo instrument. Stefan Asbury attentively traces the twists and turns of Kühr's music, Kopatchinskaja impresses with competent mastery of the required instrumental techniques and an exact execution of the mood swings that include passages full of fragility with icy tones as well as eruptions full of emotion and warm intonations. Above all, the last third of the work becomes so intense that one hardly dares to breathe. …
…For me, this production is without a doubt one of the most exciting records of this late year, for it is an important document that addresses the relevance of composing for the concert genre, and for this alone already deserves a high repertoire value. …
Süddeutsche Zeitung (by Johannes Rubner), July 8, 2008
"Nerve-Racking"
Gerd Kührs "Magnificat" in the Herz-Jesu-Kirche.
He only wants to tell, not comment and evaluate, says Gerd Kühr about his composition the "Magnificat". But of course he does more than just that. Right at the beginning of the soprano there is already a nerve-racking scream, not just an invocation. Kühr, born in 1952, is an exegete, one who brings the word to the forefront. His work commissioned for the series "Paradisi Gloria" in the Herz-Jesu-Kirche adds texts from Rilke and Lichtenberg to the Latin Magnificat, and attempts to achieve constructive density and gain new positions from the contrast. The central figure is the singer, the choir mediates with some echoes of earlier music history, and the orchestra reinforces. The soprano Angelika Luz is outstanding, perfectly supported by the baritone Adrian Eröd as well as the Bavarian Radio Choir and the Munich Radio Symphony Orchestra directed by Ulf Schirmer. …
Münchner Merkur Nr. 156 (by Tobias Hell), July 7, 2008
"Debut Performance at 'Paradisi Gloria'"
… stronger yet even in direct comparison with Gerd Kühr's "Magnificat", which was baptized this evening with great commitment by the conductor Ulf Schirmer. Whereby in Kühr's richly contrasting score the passages that remain in one's mind above all, are those that the composer wrote for the as always superior Bavarian Radio Choir.
Die Presse (wawe), April 7, 2008
"Only Color and Brush Strokes"
Gerd Kühr's "Linie Punkt Fläche Raum": melodic painting with the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra directed by de Billy.
The score as a canvas, the orchestra as a palette of colors – rarely do metaphors from painting appear to fit so well when referring to music as they do this time. For Gerd Kühr, who likes to dedicate himself to tricky compositional tasks, took on the challenge of reproducing the phenomena of applied arts with melodic means. The debut performance of his laconic, yet precisely name work "Linie Punkt Fläche Raum" was the center point of a concert by the yet again sensitive and concentrated Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, with the principal conductor Bertrand de Billy in place of Okko Kamu who had fallen ill. A powerful, spontaneous brushstroke, a shake of the wrist sending apparently random drops of paint onto the canvas: for such steadfast painter tricks, a composer must invest an enormous amount of time in contemplation and execution. Yet Kühr succeeded in the six miniatures in conserving such immediacy for the ear and giving them new life at the moment of the performance. With great accuracy, impressions of painting techniques are awakened, the precisely set sounds appear obvious, plausible and yet not predictable. …
Der Standard (by Daniel Ender), April 7, 2008
"The Tone Makes the Music"
The Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra with a debut performance from Gerd Kühr im Musikverein
Everyone knows that each room has a specific sound, even if you're not always aware of it. Not even in the Goldenen Saal of the Musikverein with its renowned acoustics. John Cage once sang a song about it, that the audience and musician share the same resonance space. But in the every day concert experience we find it more annoying than anything else: the coughs, mobile phones.
It was no different at the last subscription concert of the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, but it experienced an expansion. For already after the break, as the room was still filled with the expectant murmurs of a debut performance, it began unnoticed because it was quieter than the whispered discussions. Seamless, because the piece began with a noise, that nestled up to the sounds in the hall, as if they were meant to be together. "Linie Punkt Fläche Raum" began in near silence, in that Gerd Kühr embarked on a search for traces of musical analogies to applied arts and at the outset of the sketched space placed punctual events, joining them to lines, to then expand them. Much of it brought Friedrich Cerhas monumental "Spiegel" cycle from the 1960's to mind.
Yet the composition techniques have been disproportionately refined since then. In order to remain in the scene: although the brushes have not become more exact, many more are used at the same time. Masterfully and humbly, never flamboyantly, Kühr makes his strokes, astonishing is the economy of the material, its close ties that remain audible in its various manifestations. The accurate orchestra, under the direction of Bertrand de Billy, contributed decisively. …
Salzburger Nachrichten (by Heinz Rögl), November 13, 2006
"Violine Capriccios"
Wien Modern: Debut performance of Gerd Kühr's violine concert "Movimenti" by the Vienna Radio Symphonic Orchestra directed by Stefan Asbury with the violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja.
… The Carinthian composer created a composed reflection about the clichés of virtuosity, about the role distribution between soloist and orchestra. This soon calls for a big solo with rhythmically, exquisitely "skewed" Hungarian rhapsody cascades, later, bound by sordinos, the intimately romantic cantilenas. Gerd Kühr proves himself to be a great, enigmatic humorist with his work commissioned for the Vienna Mozart Year. The spirited violinist "eats it up". The work comes full circle when unexpectedly the violinist begins to tune her instrument again, and with a pizzicato volte of the empty string the piece abruptly and immensely dramatically ends. Or does it? Applause, the already informed ushers open the doors to the Musikverein and the hall begins to fill with the sounds of the break, when the soloist swaggers triumphantly back onto the stage once again brandishing her violin. Of course Gerd Kühr also included her "Encore" in his composition.
This debut performance was the unrivaled highlight of the Vienna Radio Symphonic Orchestra concert that was impressively opened with Gyögy Kurtag's "New Messages". …
Radio – Stefan Asbury (Ö1, "gehört" November 2006)
Reminisces of "Movimenti"
… also the Movimenti (2006) from Gerd Kühr, born in 1952 – humorous and enigmatic performances in celebration of the Mozart Year 2006 – begin with acting performances by the orchestra in which the violinist jumps in just as unexpectedly as when after soulful cantilenas, Hungarian rhapsodies and rhythmic capriccios that appear to have faded to a close spring up again from the depths for yet another cadenza. …
