Helmut Lachenmann: Das Mädchen mit den Schwefelhölzern

Featuring

Lothar Zagrosek
Elizabeth Keusch
Sarah Leonard
Salome Kammer
Yukiko Sugawara-Lachenmann
Tomoko Hemmi

Mayumi Miyata
Württembergisches Staatsorchester Stuttgart
Staatsopernchor Stuttgart
Helmut Lachenmann

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Instruments

The opera features a 'Shô,' a type of mouth organ and ritual instrument from Japanese Gagaku music, which produces a 'silvery removed sound.'

Composer's Artistic Vision

Lachenmann views composing as an attempt to overcome traumas and challenges familiar genres by 'bursting them open from inside' to renew listening.

Composition History

Lachenmann's opera, "Das Mädchen mit den Schwefelhölzern," incorporates texts from Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale, a letter by Gudrun Ensslin, and writings by Leonardo da Vinci.

Composer's Artistic Vision

Helmut Lachenmann, the composer, aimed to highlight the violence and bourgeois indifference latent in Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale, "The Little Match Girl."

Composer Biography

The composer, Helmut Lachenmann, knew Gudrun Ensslin, a German terrorist, in his childhood, as their fathers were colleagues.

Compositional Technique

The opera features abrupt orchestral strokes from historical literature, including works by Stravinsky, Beethoven, Schoenberg, Boulez, Mahler, and Berg, which are alienated from their original contexts.