Hans-Karsten Raecke

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Hans-Karsten Raecke with his blow metal can harp

Hans-Karsten Raecke (born September 12, 1941 in Rostock ) is a German composer and inventor of musical instruments. In 1991 he founded the Klangwerkstatt eV in Mannheim, which later moved to the "Musikbrennerei" Rheinsberg .

resume

Raecke grew up in a musical family. His father, a commercial artist, played the piano and his mother the violin. After his father fell in the Soviet Union in 1944 and his mother went to the Federal Republic of Germany after their second marriage , he grew up with his grandmother in Bad Sülze , Mecklenburg , where he received his first piano lessons at the age of five and later clarinet lessons.

From 1962 to 1968 he studied composition , choir and ensemble direction, piano and clarinet at the “Hanns Eisler” University of Music in Berlin with Rudolf Wagner-Régeny and also directed several choirs. After his exams, he taught as a lecturer at the Humboldt University in Berlin in the subjects of basic music theory training, piano practice, harmony, counterpoint and composition. In 1972 he received "a prize in the international choir competition of the socialist states in Prague for the cantata 'Lamentation Against the War' for baritone solo, twelve choir soloists, choir, speaker and image projections." From 1972 to 1975 Raecke was a master student in composition at the Academy of Arts with Paul Dessau . In 1974 he finished teaching at the Humboldt University and founded the Berliner Klangwerkstatt .

Since then, Raecke went his own musical way with the construction of new wind and string instruments, the sound expansion of the grand piano and the inclusion of electronic music . Performances in Eastern Europe, several appearances at the Warsaw Autumn and a work grant at the electronic studio in Warsaw followed. In 1980, conflicts with GDR cultural policy prompted Raecke to move to the Federal Republic of Germany.

In 1980 Raecke was awarded the Kranichstein Music Prize at the Darmstadt Summer Courses for his solo performances . He received scholarships in 1981 at the experimental studio of the Heinrich Strobel Foundation in Freiburg im Breisgau , in 1982 at the IRCAM in Paris and in 1990 at the Kunststiftung Baden-Württemberg . In 1985, at the invitation of the University of Music Würzburg, he presented his newly developed instruments as part of the “Days of New Music”, in which unusual sound generators and sound sculptures by around 30 artists from 5 European countries were exhibited and acoustically tested in experimental forms. In addition to works by Anestis Logothetis , Klaus Ager u. a. Raecke's composition “The Mecklenburg Horse” was also published on the double LP “sound sculptures”.

From 1986 to 1993 Raecke taught musical subjects in the music therapy department at the SRH Hochschule Heidelberg . Concert tours using the instruments he had further developed live, electronically and technically, took him through Europe from 1990, including to London, Amsterdam, Brussels, Stockholm, Vienna, Graz, Basel, Berlin, Warsaw, Krakow , Brno and Tallinn , as well as to the UNITED STATES. In 1991 he founded the Mannheimer Klangwerkstatt and was the organizer and artistic director of the Klangwerkstatt Musiktage Mannheim . Raecke was represented with his own concert contribution at the EXPO 2000 in Hanover. In 2003 he was appointed a member of the Free Academy of the Arts Mannheim . In 2014 he moved to Rheinsberg near Berlin and started work on the music distillery project there .

Artistic activity

Hans-Karsten Raecke is one of those composers who, by designing and building new sound generators, by modifying the construction of existing instruments and by including improvisation, have taken the composition process out of the tightness of traditional academic teaching content and expanded it. He understands the work processes of musical inventing, writing and playing in the sense of holistic artistic thinking as an indissoluble unit. In many cases, the live electronics are an important part of this. In the beginning he had created works for traditional instruments that were permeated and determined by serial and aleatoric elements, in 1972 “a new creative phase” emerged for him. As early as 1971 he had started to experiment with the preparation of the grand piano in search of ways of expanding the sound. The preparation system, which has grown over many years, is tuned to a tone series mode and consists of 12 sound groups, which lead over from the pure piano tone to the noise. The sampler technology made it possible to transfer this preparation system to a master keyboard. Here Raecke completed the compositional development from bitonal, 12 tone, serial and aleatoric working methods to forms of model composition. In many of his scores he overcomes the narrowness of traditional notation and, due to its highly developed and differentiated visual design, is to be regarded as an exponent of musical graphics . Since 1975 Raecke's workshop has produced around 70 new types of wind and string instruments, for each of which he has created distinctive compositions (see “Works” below). To see Raecke's sound generator in the context of an artistic trend that came from the USA and began with Harry Partch seems a mistake, as the artistic situation in the GDR in the 1970s hardly allowed such influences. Rather, Raecke followed his own impulses and developed his instruments for his performances as an improviser. Here he came unmistakably close to jazz . In collaboration with the jazz musician Günter “Baby” Sommer, “The secret thoughts of a pachyderm at an inopportune time” for new wind instruments and drums were created.

In addition to all of the original joy in playing and the desire to experiment with sound, the music productions that were made in the GDR in the 1970s are an expression of an unlimited need for freedom and independence. The Paul Dessau student Raecke, who never "denies his musical and political origins", is convinced that "music must have a social claim". Some compositions have titles that are to be understood as a political statement in the spirit of Bertolt Brecht , such as B. the already mentioned "lament against the war", the "Epitaph on Martin Luther King" (1969) or "The Ashes of Birkenau" (1998). Based on Igor Stravinsky's "Story of the Soldier" and George Orwell's "1984", Raecke planned a new story of the soldier as a "sharp criticism of the military". In addition to such clearly decipherable work titles, it is also the musical gesture of "committed pathos", as it is sedimented in sound structures and melodies and understood as a message to the listener. Even the writing of the music in the form of graphic scores, which allow the interpreters maximum creative freedom, may be an indication of the rebellion against any form of nagging. In a figurative sense, such works are to be understood as attempts to break out, where the music approaches cosmic visions, such as B. "Sternbilder" (first time 1974; 2000), "Sonnenwind" (1993/94), "Cygnus und Lyra" (2018). Unmistakably Raecke's world of sound and ideas "has its points of orientation both in European and in non-European music."

Works (selection)

Vocal works

  • Lament against the war ; Cantata for choir, 12 choir soloists, baritone solo, speaker and image projection; Texts: René Schwachhofer (1972)
  • The ashes of Birkenau ; Solo cantata for male voice and grand piano four hands with live electronics; Texts: Stephan Hermlin (1998)
  • Germany, a winter fairy tale ; A musical-dramatic cycle for voice and grand piano; Texts: Heinrich Heine (2003)

Orchestral works

  • Stage plays and suite of variations for orchestra (1968)
  • Reise with three chords for electronic organ and orchestra (1974)

Chamber music

  • 5 canons on a fugue theme by JSBach for string quartet (1970)
  • Temperaments for cello solo (1977)

Piano / expanded grand piano

  • Theme with variations for piano (1964)
  • SONATA IN D for piano (1968)

Works for your own instruments

  • So......? (A warning song) / ... Or something like that? (A song of repentance) for tenor bambuphon and tape (1978)
  • Kalamos for bamboo shawm and tape (1979)
  • Water Music for Gummiphon with and without Water (1979)
  • In the draft for blown bamboo wire can (1979)
  • Out of calm for variable plug-in bambuphone, tape and Iron Triangle (1979)
  • Air - pressure - zones for tenor pulling metal audible (1982)
  • To the sources for blown metal can harp (1982)
  • Proton gallop for tenor slide metal earphone, electronic sounds and percussion (1982)

electronics

  • Montage for trombone and tape (1972)
  • Biotron tape composition with new instruments and electronics (1980)
  • Constellations I - III for Sound-Image-Generator (2000)

Edits

Discography

  • The Mecklenburg Horse - Warmblood for tenor - suraphone and expanded piano, on: LP "sound sculptures" WERGO SM 1049/50 (1985)
  • Because we should re-learn nature for a grand piano and speaking voice, on: "Instrumentales Theater", a publication in the series "Music in Germany 1950 - 2000" by the German Music Council; BMG Classics; Order no. 74321 73653 2 (published in 2004)

Published in the Raecke Klangwerkstatt Edition:

  • Germany, a winter fairy tale - a musical-dramatic cycle for voice and grand piano
  • Air - pressure - zones as well as Because we should learn nature again and further works on: New instrument art for new music 1
  • Raster 2 and Raster 4 as well as shamrocks (selection) and other works for grand piano: New instrument art for new music 2
  • Raster 6 , Raster 7 , Raster 9 as well as clovers (selection) on: The sound expanded grand piano 1
  • Timing 3 and other works on: The sound-widened grand piano 2
  • Time Without Hope and other works (improvisation) together with Joe Hackbarth
  • Elements for pipe bowl (with live electronics) and blue for blow metal can harp (with live electronics)
  • Art finals (a musical play in 14 acts)
  • Asleep (master keyboard and sampler)
  • Sound images for instruments by Hans-Karsten Raecke and Hugh Davies
  • Shiva Bells , Mandala and other works (together with Mani Neumeier ) on: Prescanned Passages
  • Pictures at an exhibition (adaptation of Mussorgsky's music for choir and instrumental ensemble)
  • Music in the Park (an open air canon for the trees and people in Luisenpark Mannheim)

As well as 6 CDs with recordings of the Klangwerkstatt Musiktage Mannheim (from 1992 to 2001)

literature

  • Riemann Musik-Lexikon, supplementary volume Person Teil, Mainz (1975), p. 438.
  • U. Stürzbecher: Composers in the GDR - 17 conversations ; Hildesheim 1979, pp. 332-248.
  • G. Crepaz: Fun and bitter seriousness - some remarks on Hans-Karsten Raecke , in: Neuland III (1982/83) pp. 78–80.
  • D. Töpfer: With self-made instruments - Hans-Karsten Raeckes blowpipe and string music , in: MusikTexte No. 9 (1985), pp. 32–36.
  • E. Ditter-Stolz: Hans-Karsten Raecke , in: Composers of the Present (Edition text + criticism), loose-leaf edition, 5th subsequent delivery.
  • The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians (2nd edition) Vol. 20 (2001) ISBN 0-333-60800-3

Web links

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Edeltraut Ditter-Stolz (see "Literature") p. 2.
  2. ↑ Not to be confused with the "Klangwerkstatt Berlin" founded in 1989 ( http://klangwerkstatt-berlin.de/2018/archiv.html )
  3. ↑ s. Discography
  4. ↑ About us . Music distillery. Retrieved May 28, 2019.
  5. ↑ See The New Grove, p. 748.
  6. ↑ Edeltraut Ditter-Stolz (see "Literature") p. 2.
  7. ↑ Frank Gertich, Art. "Sound Sculptures" in: "Sound Art" (Ed. Helga de la Motte-Haber); Laaber 1999, p. 174.
  8. ↑ Ralf-Carl Langhals "High Percentage Task", in: Mannheimer Morgen September 12, 2016, p. 32.
  9. ↑ Handwritten note, published in: G. Crepaz (see "Literature".) P. 80.
  10. ↑ Gerhard Crepaz (see "Literature") p. 78.
  11. ↑ Edeltraut Ditter-Stolz (see "Literature") p. 2.
personal data
SURNAME Raecke, Hans-Karsten
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Raecke, Hans-Carsten
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German composer
DATE OF BIRTH September 12, 1941
PLACE OF BIRTH Rostock