| Der Handschuh | |
|---|---|
| by Graham Waterhouse | |
 Composer Graham Waterhouse, 2011 | |
| English | The Glove |
| Year | 2005 |
| Period | contemporary |
| Text | Friedrich Schiller: Der Handschuh |
| Published | 2007: Wilhelmshaven Heinrichshofen's Verlag |
| Movements | 1 |
| Scoring | cello, speaking voice |
Der Handschuh (The Glove) is a composition by Graham Waterhouse. He wrote the setting of Friedrich Schiller's ballad for cello and speaking voice in 2005. It was published in 2007 in Heinrichshofen's Verlag.
Graham Waterhouse composed Der Handschuh in 2005, as a kind of melodrama in the tradition of spoken narrative to instrumental accompaniment, such as ballads by Robert Schumann and Richard Strauss, a crucial scene of Weber's opera Der Freischütz and 20th century settings by Schoenberg, William Walton, Henze and Poulenc's L'Histoire de Babar, le petit éléphant. [1] It is the composer's first major work for the combination of Sprechstimme (speaking voice) and his instrument, the cello. Until then he had occasionally set texts to music for the unusual scoring. In 1995 he wrote Vezza, a limerick on whether/weather as a German might pronounce it, [2] recorded in 2002 with the composer speaking and playing. [3] In 2001 he set Flohlied (Song of the Flea), the satirical song from Goethe's Faust I, to music, [4] published by Heinrichshofen's Verlag. [5] The final poem of his song cycle Sechs späteste Lieder (six latest songs, 2003) after Friedrich Hölderlin for mezzo-soprano and cello is spoken. [6]
He composed Der Handschuh in 2005 for the 200th anniversary of Schiller's death. Following its success, he wrote more frequently for the combination of cello and speaking voice. In 2006 he set to music Animalia, three funny poems on animals by Hans Krieger. [7] In 2007 he wrote Das Hexen-Einmaleins (The Witches One-Times-One), [8] again from Goethe's Faust and published by Heinrichshofen's Verlag in 2009., [5] the dramatic monologue Aases Himmelfahrt from Henrik Ibsen's Peer Gynt , [9] Gruselett after Christian Morgenstern's nonsense poem for three speaking voices and string trio, [10] and Belsatzar on Heinrich Heine's Romanze. [11] In 2010 he composed Der Werwolf after a poem by Morgenstern, and a different setting The Banshee on its English version by Max Knight. [12]
The composer summarises the ballad Der Handschuh , which Schiller wrote in 1797 in a friendly ballad competition with Goethe: "The story is set in the reign of the French King François I. In it the king stages a fight between a variety of wild animals for the entertainment of his guests (we read in the "Essais historiques sur Paris" of Monsieur de Saint-Foix that an arena existed in what is now known as the "Rue des Lions" in Paris). The animals, however, prove to be placid creatures: the real contest plays itself out among the spectators, when a certain Dame Cunigund challenges her lover to demonstrate his affection for her by retrieving a glove she had affected to let fall accidentally into the arena. This he does, to the amazement of the crowd; at the end, however, events take an unexpected turn." [13]
The different actors, including the animals, are portrayed musically in leitmotifs. The piece is intended to be performed by one person reciting and playing, but can also be performed by a cellist and a speaker. [13]
The composer has frequently performed the work speaking and playing simultaneously. He showed it in 2005 in a portrait concert in St. Martin, Idstein, [14] and in a Gesprächskonzert (lecture concert) in Würzburg. [15] In 2008 he performed it in Cambridge in a program "Melodrama revisited – new compositions for cello and speaking voice", while he was a "Musician By-Fellow" at Churchill College. [16] The program was repeated for a composer's colloquium at the University of Oldenburg, conducted by Violeta Dinescu. [6] [17] Waterhouse also performed the work with a speaker, such as Gerd Udo Feller (in German) at the Gasteig Munich on 14 December 2008, in a program with works by Bach, Pablo Neruda, Benjamin Britten, Paul Hindemith, and with other settings for cello and speaking voice by Waterhouse. [6] [18] On 12 December 2011 he performed it with speaker Peter Weiß (in German) in a family concert in Gilching, together with Flohlied and Der Werwolf. [6] [19]
Der Handschuh was published in 2007 in both German and English by Heinrichshofen's Verlag, Wilhelmshaven, which also published Flohlied, Das Hexen-Einmaleins and Gruselett. [5]
Christian Otto Josef Wolfgang Morgenstern was a German writer and poet from Munich. Morgenstern married Margareta Gosebruch von Liechtenstern on 7 March 1910. He worked for a while as a journalist in Berlin, but spent much of his life traveling through Germany, Switzerland, and Italy, primarily in a vain attempt to recover his health. His travels, though they failed to restore him to health, allowed him to meet many of the foremost literary and philosophical figures of his time in central Europe.
Johannes Wolfgang Zender was a German conductor and composer. He was the chief conductor of several opera houses, and his compositions, many of them vocal music, have been performed at international festivals.
Leopold van der Pals was a Danish/Dutch modernist composer who developed a personal and lyrical style in composing by involving elements of late romanticism, expressionism and impressionism.
Graham Waterhouse is an English composer and cellist who specializes in chamber music. He has composed a cello concerto, Three Pieces for Solo Cello and Variations for Cello Solo for his own instrument, and string quartets and compositions that juxtapose a quartet with a solo instrument, including Piccolo Quintet, Bassoon Quintet and the piano quintet Rhapsodie Macabre. He has set poetry for speaking voice and cello, such as Der Handschuh, and has written song cycles. His compositions reflect the individual capacity and character of players and instruments, from the piccolo to the contrabassoon.
Gestural Variations, Op. 43, is a trio composition by Graham Waterhouse in 1997 originally for oboe, bassoon and piano. Later versions are scored for clarinet, cello and piano (1999) and flute, cello and piano (2009).
"Der Handschuh" is a ballad by Friedrich Schiller, written in 1797, the year of his friendly ballad competition with Goethe. Other ballads written that year include Schiller's "Der Gang nach dem Eisenhammer", "Die Kraniche des Ibykus", "Der Ring des Polykrates", "Ritter Toggenburg", "Der Taucher", and Goethe's "Die Braut von Korinth", "Der Gott und die Bajadere", "Der Schatzgräber (Goethe)", "The Sorcerer's Apprentice".
Rudi Spring is a German composer of classical music, pianist and academic. He is known for vocal compositions on texts by poets and his own, and for chamber music such as his three Chamber Symphonies.
Bei Nacht, op. 50, is a piano trio, composed in 1999 by Graham Waterhouse, published by Hofmeister, Leipzig.
Handschuh may refer to:
Siegfried Köhler was a German composer in the German Democratic Republic.
Graham Waterhouse, cellist and composer especially of chamber music, has written a number of song cycles. As a cellist, he has used string instruments or a Pierrot ensemble instead of the typical piano to accompany a singer. In 2003 he composed a first cycle of songs based on late poems by Friedrich Hölderlin. In 2016, he set nursery rhymes, excerpts from James Joyce, and texts by Shakespeare. In 2017, he wrote settings of poems by Irish female writers, and in 2022 a cycle of Buddhist texts for mezzo-soprano, cello and piano.
"Gesang der Geister über den Wassern" is a 1779 poem by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832). It may be best known in the English-speaking world through a musical setting of 1820–21 by Franz Schubert (1797–1828) as a part song for men's voices and low strings (D.714).
Reinhard Pfundt is a German pianist, composer and academic teacher at the University of Music and Theatre Leipzig. He wrote orchestral works, chamber music and songs, and was awarded prizes in the German Democratic Republic (DDR).
Variations for Cello Solo is a composition written by Graham Waterhouse in 2019. The variations depict characters of personalities. The cellist and composer performed the world premiere in Vienna in 2020. The composition was published by Schott the same year.
Rudolf Mors was a German composer.
Balladenjahr refers to the year 1797 in the history of German literature, in which many of the best-known ballads of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Friedrich Schiller originated within a few months, such as Goethe's "Der Zauberlehrling" and Schiller's "Der Ring des Polykrates", "Der Taucher", "Der Handschuh", "Der Gang nach dem Eisenhammer", "Ritter Toggenburg", and "Die Kraniche des Ibykus".
Wolfgang Schoor was a German composer, who wrote orchestral works, song cycles and chamber music and the music for numerous children's and documentary films and radio plays.
Alfred Koerppen was a German organist, music pedagogue, composer and academic teacher. He taught composition and music theory at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hannover from 1948 to 1991. His compositions focus on choral music with and without accompaniment, but he also wrote symphonies, chamber music and stage works.
Der Handschuh is a German lied written by Robert Schumann and published in 1850 as his Op.87. The song's text is the eponymous poem by German poet Friedrich Schiller, written in 1797 as part of a ballad competition alongside friend and colleague Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.
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