Oxalys & Het Collectief

Double concert Igor Stravinsky first heard Arnold Schoenberg's 'Pierrot Lunaire' in Berlijn in 1912. His fascination with the work's individualised instrumentation and the conciseness of its individual parts led Stravinsky to write his 'Trois Poèmes de lyrique japonaise'. Maurice Ravel was in his turn inspired by Stravinsky's description of 'Pierrot Lunaire' and composed 'Trois Poèmes de Mallarmé'. Both Ravel and Stravinsky thereby remained true to their own aesthetics: hedonism and a mixture of timbres accompany Mallarmé's hermetic poetry while Stravinsky's highly apt and economic writing provides the perfect translation of the Japanese haikus. Schoenberg's pioneering score, written for the spoken-word performer Albertine Zehme, is based on poetry by the Belgian author Albert Guiraud. The tragic clown Pierrot is the instrument through which romantic sentiment is finished with. The sarcastic and caustic tone of this atonal masterpiece contrasts with Korngold's late Romantic works from the same period. This is a programme on symbolism, l'art pour l'art and notable cross-fertilisation which at the same time introduces us to the refined song-writing of Ravel's pupil Maurice Delage.