Widmann / Faust / Queyras / Aimard

A dreamlike constellation: Jörg Widmann, Isabelle Faust, Jean-Guihen Queyras and Pierre-Laurent Aimard dedicate themselves to Olivier Messiaen's timeless »Quatuor pour la fin du temps«.

Messiaen's »Quartet for the End of Time«
Messiaen composed the work as an inmate of the German prisoner-of-war camp Stalag VIII-A in Görlitz. Inspired by the Book of Revelation, he understood his deeply spiritual piece, as he himself explained, »as an homage to the angel of the Apocalypse, who raises his hand to heaven and says: 'There will be no more time'.« The unusual instrumentation – clarinet, violin, cello and piano – resulted from the musicians who were also imprisoned in the camp. The premiere took place on 1 January 1941 in front of around 400 prisoners of war in the camp, with Messiaen himself playing the piano part. »Never again was he listened to with such attention and understanding«, wrote the composer decades later.

Musical modernism with Berg, Ravel & Carter
Arnold Schönberg attested to the expressive »Four Pieces for Clarinet and Piano« by his pupil Alban Berg as »Romanticism without tonal ties«. These concentrated miniatures are heard in the first half of the programme alongside Maurice Ravel's important »Sonata for Violin and Violoncello«, which Ravel himself saw as a turning point in the development of his musical work. Elliott Carter's »Epigrams« consist of twelve short movements for piano trio. Like the ancient Greek literary form on which they are modelled, the movements are characterised by surprising and witty changes of direction and mood.