Fünf Choretüden (2008/9)

für Jugendliche oder Amateure

easy studies of new music techniques for non-professional choir

• Text: collage of names, speech sounds etc.
• Language: German
• Instrumentation: choir: S A Bar
• Movements: 5
• Duration: 12'-14'
• Prize: Kompositionswettbewerb "ad libitum", Stuttgart 2009
• Premiere: 24.07.2009 Jugendkongress Neue Musik, Stuttgart; pupils of elementary music school
• Publisher: Breitkopf & Härtel



Program Note:




(EN)

Fünf Choretüden were written originally for the purpose of workshop for amateur choir singers, where I was invited as conducting composer. I decided to provide the participants with techniques of new music, which they usually do not meet in repertoire of their choirs. Therefore I wrote five studies, each based on one problem such as indeterminacy, aleatory, glissandi, Klangfarbenmelodie and sonoristic tools derived from speech and unusual use of voice.

The interpretation demands were kept on level accessible to nonprofessionals. The piece is intended for choir, where female voices are in majority and male voices are more or less baritones with limited voice range. Skills of the involved singers may differ, simple graphic and textual notation makes most of the reading easier for people, who feel scared of scores. Any selection of the studies in any order may be performed. Some of the studies are very easy to perform (especially No.1), some offer choice between less and more difficult alternatives (No. 2 and 3).

To open up a new music language to possibly shy singers, the piece works mostly with humor and absurdity both in activities demanded (such as Indian shriek from Western movies) and in text (e.g. the funny mass of names extremely diverse historically and culturally, but creating an impressive sound unity, in Study No.3). However, there is also lyricism (modal material of the aleatoric Study No.2) and even dramatic expression (the study on glissandi, No.5).




Martin Smolka