 |
 |
|
 |
||
|
Five Pieces
for Piano (1964) Kristi Becker, Piano Pi-hsien Chen, Piano CPO 999 954-2 [Recorded in Cologne 2000, TT: 67 mins] York Höller (b. 1944) was a familiar figure in London during the '80s, including appearances at the BBC R3 College Concerts, since when he seemed to have 'disappeared'. It is interesting to see this reflected with performances by the BBC Symphony Orchestra in the His Life in Outline listings here, in which one can see his wide international involvement, latterly centred in Germany. Although prominent in the development of electronic and computer music, the piano remains the instrument to which Höller retains deepest ties, and in his piano music he appears uninterested in burrowing beneath the lid for special effects. So this is music in which notes, melodic figures and chords retain primacy, these all sounding natural to the ordinary 21st C listener, even though their complicated constructions are outlined in the composer's excellent liner notes. Those begin unpromisingly by Höller telling us that he destroyed nearly all of his compositions from the 1960s as 'not progressive enough'. The 1964 pieces saved as his "Opus 1" are twelve-tone with the usual manipulations; the others indicating their musical indebtedness in subtitles; the homage to Bartok treating his Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion to construction of a 12-tone row, and Höller's Sonate informelle in free atonality, appropriating 'the dialectical principle of Beethoven's late sonatas'. Lisztian influences are overt in the other sonata, but it is convincing and free from a feeling of pastiche. The Partita is 'obliged to the spirits of JSB and Claude Debussy', polarities that his teacher B A Zimmermann 'constantly encouraged me to blend and transform'. A rewarding
journey through an oeuvre which should be known in UK, and
tackled by young pianists. Excellent presentation, immaculate playing
and ensemble in the two-piano works, impeccable recording by WDR. |
York
Höller Works
for one and two pianos