Silence is gold

Featuring

Jan Philip Schulze
Kilian Herold
Sarah Maria Sun
Franz Schubert
George Gershwin
Benjamin Britten

Benj Pasek
Leonard Bernstein
György Ligeti
Georges Aperghis
Steven Lutvak

Did you know?

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Interpretation

The album features a unique arrangement of Ligeti's 'Mysteries of the Macabre' for coloratura soprano, clarinet/bass clarinet, and piano, created by Jan Philip Schulze.

Album & Artwork

The album is titled 'Silence is Golden' and is conceived as a 'dramedy album', aiming to make heavy content digestible through humor.

Historical Context

Music historians interpret 'Spring' in Schubert's 'Der Hirt auf dem Felsen' as a coded reference to the desire for political change during Metternich's secret police regime after 1815.

Composition History

Schubert's 'Der Hirt auf dem Felsen' (The Shepherd on the Rock) is considered the inspiration for many later works using the same instrumentation, and it marks the nucleus of this album's ensemble.

Composer Biography

György Ligeti, at 27, bravely set poems by Attila József, a Hungarian author who committed suicide after being expelled from the Communist Party, into art songs in Stalinist Hungary, a form considered regressive at the time.

Composer's Artistic Vision

The artists believe humor allows for a distanced perspective on serious issues, potentially opening up solutions to problems.

Performer Biography

Sarah Maria Sun, one of the album's performers, has a repertoire of 2000 compositions, including 400 world premieres, and was nominated as Singer of the Year for her interpretations of complex female roles.