KOGLMANN TIMES TWO
Franz Koglmann 07 / 08 is the title of a tribute event for the Viennese composer and trumpeter held on 12 December 2008, at 19:30 at the Großer Sendesaal at ORF-RadioKulturhaus. The composition cycle Lo-lee-ta represents an attempt to translate a number of narrative strands and character profiles from the work of the great Russian-American writer Vladimir Nabokov into the abstract language of music. The audience will also have the oporutnity to enjoy Nocturnal Walks live. Koglmann’s very personal take on Joseph Haydn’s Hermannstadt Symphony was premiered in Sibiu/Romania in 2007 on the occasion of Sibiu being nominated European Capital of Culture. It was, in a way, the unofficial start of the Haydn year.
Koglmann times two, in a late-autumnal context: Lo-lee-ta, composed for the “Monoblue Quartet” with Tony Coe (saxophone, clarinet), Ed Renshaw (guitar) and Peter Herbert (bass), accepts the challenge of exploring the texts of Nabokov, who made “deception, pitfalls, surrendering of cover, deceit verging on witchcraft” the maxims of his literary creations, and recreating them as sounds and musical quests. The starting point for his Nabokov series is the “Love Theme from Lolita” by Bob Harris from the eponymous film by Kubrick. Not much more than a creative seed; the musical genetic material is driven through a series of permutations, inversions, withdrawals and polyphone ramifications and, like a prism, reflects the diverse facets of Nabokov’s sophisticated narrative art.
The second part of the evening will see the performance of Nocturnal Walks by the “exxj ... ensemble xx. Jahrhundert” under the leadership of Peter Burwik. A different game, a different test rig. The sound haikus of Lo-lee-ta are replaced by epic acoustics: a chamber orchestra instead of chamber jazz, a broad brush instead of a charcoal drawing.
Nocturnal Walks does not replace language with music. Language is present in the composition in the shape of the recorded voice of the ingenious aphorist E. M. Cioran.
The accordion burping in a pub, the wind instruments indulging in Mahler-like glissandi and slide effects. Everything is crooked and dangling on its hinges, kept upright only by the oscillations of a vibraphone. Franz Koglmann indulges in a rare outing from the ivory tower, venturing forth into the vulgar nether grounds of the human and all too human, unabashedly quoting from popular sounds, gipsy music and majestic symphony, and enjoying the dialectic relationship between the sublime and the grotesque. Nocturnal Walks: music that seems to have been blown here by a wind that roams the peripheral spheres of consciousness, recognizable and yet remote. Vladimir Nabokov thought that while you could get closer and closer to reality you could never get close enough, and he defined it as “an infinite succession of steps, levels of perceptions, false bottoms”.
After the performance Lo-lee-ta – Music on Nabokov will be recorded on CD for the col legno record label.
Informations:
Ingrid Karl – Wiener Musik Galerie
Tel: +43-1-544 89 29, Fax: +43-1-544 89 22, e-mail: koka@wmg.at
www.wmg.at
Barbara Hufnagl – Pressebüro RadioKulturhaus
Tel: +43-1-50101- 18175, e-mail: barbara.hufnagl@ORF.at
radiokulturhaus.ORF.at