HYDRA

Premiered at

REAKTOR Vienna

20.5.2025

HYDRA (2025)

for narrator, saxophone, e-guitar, violoncello, percussion and live-electronics

Duration: 9'

Program note

In my compositional work, states of suspension, layering and subtle gradations in the border area of sound and color have played an important role for several years. My intention was to make this world of complex micro-sounds accessible to the audience, that demand enormous control from the performers and at the same time expose them: every tremor of the bow is audible, every change can cause the sound to break off or drift away at any time.The audience witnesses this precarious attempt. On the other hand I am fascinated by the point at which instrumental identities merge into a kind of hyper-sound through the superimposition of a multitude of complex, sometimes chaotic instrumental spectra and an excess of energy. The materiality of the sounds thus comes to the fore at the expense of their identity.

In HYDRA, I place this concept in the context of Heiner Müller's "Herakles II or the Hydra": Heracles fights against the mythical beast, which, upon each severed head, grows two new heads. His desperate attempt to defeat the Hydra reflects the helplessness in the face of insoluble conflicts and symbolizes the eternal struggle against injustice and tyranny. The question arises whether an individual is even capable of defeating the powers of a system that continuously regenerates. The struggle of a person to control a phenomenon can ultimately be understood as the true musical drama, inherently inscribed with the loss of control.