In a film portrait of dancer, painter and sculptor Antje Tesche-Mentzen, I learned that in former times she was a proficient pianist. When she told me that she intended to begin playing again, I promised to compose her a cycle for her new beginning : 34 miniatures, some of them with a direct connection to her paintings and sculptures. The main part of Kosmos was composed in 2014, 400 years after Albrecht Dürer created his copperplate engraving 'Melencolia I', in which a magic square appears. In a magicsquare, numbers are arranged in a grid so that their sum in each column, row, and the two diagonals is the same number. In the square I have chosen, the magic number is 34. Wilfried Hiller Instrumentation : piano (2 pieces for 2 pianos)

Kosmos - 34 miniatures pour piano. piano (2 pieces for 2 pianos).

Inspired by Heinrich Heine's poem Ihr Bild in the musical setting by Franz Schubert, the seven short movements with connecting interludes evoke the picture of a nightly round dance in an imagined sculpture park. Instrumentation : zither or harp, 2 violins, viola and double bass

Edition Schott

The five movements of this vivid opening to the exhibition are connected through pizzicato intermezzos. The fourth movement demands a second scordatura instrument ; the use of little bells and singing bowl emphasizes the multifaceted nature of the work. Instrumentation : violin solo

In his four-part song cycle, Wilfried Hiller sets various poems by Rainer Maria Rilke to music which were published between 1906 and 1913. Hiller chose the pieces according to their dramatic effect : The content they share is the awareness of topics like loneliness, death and loss ; however, neither the texts nor his composition reflect feelings of utter hopelessness. The songs were premiered at the Munich Academy of Fine Arts in 2010. Instrumentation : mezzo-soprano, viola d'amore and harp

The short two-part composition refers to two persons by the name of Teresa. One of them was a beautiful Polish actress, the other the favourite model of the painter Balthus. I tried to fuse the characteristics of both female persons with each other in the merging parts. The three-line D produced by rubbing a wine glass sounds like a faraway, almost inaudible planet tone that ends with a brief sigh. Wilfried Hiller Instrumentation : violin and piano (with wineglas)

'Tinnitus-Trio - Scene with Beethoven' deals in a subtle and parodistic manner with the question as to how Beethoven wrote his late works despite his deafness. Legend has it that he had the legs of his grand piano removed in order to transfer the vibrations directly to the ground and feel them through his body. Even Hiller's original composition which is interspersed with shreds of sound from Beethoven's Piano Sonatas Op. 31 to Op. 111 like fragments could be played on a grand piano with removed legs, but this is not obligatory. Instrumentation : clarinet in Bb, cello and piano

Der alte Köhler Jeromir und sein Sohn Josa sind eigentlich die glücklichsten Menschen auf Erden, wenn da nicht dieses eine Problem wäre : Josa ist der kleinste und schwächlichste Köhlersohn, den man je gesehen hat. Eines Tages bekommt Josa eine Zaubergeige geschenkt. Eine Geige, die jeden Zuhörer entweder groß und stark oder aber ganz klein machen kann. Und mit dieser Geige macht sich Josa auf den Weg zum Mond. Unterwegs begegnen ihm viele Menschen, denen er dank seiner Geige helfen kann. Er schafft es sogar, den gierigen König und seine Reiter zu besiegen. Tapfer zieht der kleine Josa immer weiter, bis er schließlich ans Ende der Welt gelangt. Hier kann er für den Mond spielen, der daraufhin mal kleiner und mal größer wird. Dies sieht auch der alte Jeromir und weiß, dass kein anderer als Josa ein solches Wunder zu vollbringen vermag. Ausgezeichnet mit dem Kindermedienpreis LEOPOLD vom Verband deutscher Musikschulen.

Ses oeuvres

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