Olga Neuwirth

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Olga Neuwirth (born August 4, 1968 in Graz ) is an Austrian composer .

life and work

Olga Neuwirth's father is the pianist Harry Neuwirth . She is Gösta Neuwirth's niece ; the sculptor Flora Neuwirth is her younger sister. Neuwirth met Konrad Bayer , HC Artmann and Alfred Kolleritsch through her mother, who had contacts with the Vienna Group .

Neuwirth grew up in Schwanberg and received her school education in Deutschlandsberg . She had to give up her original plans to study the trumpet after an accident with a jaw injury. As a high school student, she took part in composition workshops with Hans Werner Henze and Gerd Kühr . At sixteen she met Elfriede Jelinek , with whom she became friends. The seventeen-year-old named her first composition "The yellow cow dances ragtime".

At the 2. Jugendmusikfest Deutschlandsberg 1985 she worked with Hans Werner Henze on "Robert the Devil". This communal opera in two acts, with a libretto by Elfriede Jelinek (based on a West Styrian fairy tale), was premiered on October 27, 1985 in the Koralmhalle Deutschlandsberg.

From 1985 she studied painting and film in San Francisco at the Conservatory of Music and at the Art College. In Vienna, Olga Neuwirth continued her studies at the University of Music and Performing Arts and at the Electroacoustic Institute. From 1993 to 1994 Neuwirth studied with Tristan Murail in Paris. She received significant stimuli from encounters with Adriana Hölszky ( Don't let yourself be confused! Carry on! ) And Luigi Nono . She completed her studies with a master's thesis “On the use of film music in ' L'amour à mort ' by Alain Resnais ”.

In 1991, Olga Neuwirth became internationally known with mini-operas based on texts by Elfriede Jelinek .

Neuwirth belongs to the musical avant-garde and sees herself stimulated and inspired by her friend, the writer Elfriede Jelinek. She describes her music herself as “disaster music”, which expresses a fundamental pessimism in which there is not despair, but rather the prevailing outrage gives strength to artistic projects. Because of this attitude and the implementation of her musical works that largely eschewed harmony, Neuwirth is considered the enfant terrible of the Austrian classical music scene. The sound patterns of their music resemble tangled labyrinths and are constantly changing. Neuwirth combines classical and electronic music with natural sounds. She appreciates the countertenor as a voice, for example in Bählamms Fest (Jeremy) and Lost Highway (Mystery Man).

In 1999 the opera Bählamms Fest was premiered at the Wiener Festwochen . Neuwirth dedicated the commissioned work, which she had written in Venice since 1997, to her mother. In 2000 she was composer-in-residence at the Koninklijk Filharmonisch Orkest van Vlaanderen in Antwerp , and in 2002 (with Pierre Boulez ) at the Lucerne Festival . Her work Clinamen / Nodus , written for Pierre Boulez and the London Symphony Orchestra , was heard on a worldwide tour after its world premiere in 2000. In 2002 she was composer-in-residence at the Lucerne Festival. In 2003 the music theater Lost Highway premiered in Graz . At the Salzburg Festival in 2006 her trumpet concerto was by the Vienna Philharmonic premiered.

Olga Neuwirth took part in documenta 12 in 2007 . In 2008 the English premiere of Lost Highway took place at the English National Opera .

In 2008 she worked on the project “Der absolute Film”, in which films from the twenties were set to music: Neuwirth composed the music for Symphonie diagonale from 1924. She also wrote the music for Michael Glawogger's film Das Vaterspiel .

The commissioned work The Outcast was premiered in 2012 by Michael Simon at the Mannheim National Theater, but not in the spirit of the composer and her librettists Anna Mitgutsch and Barry Gifford . Her orchestral work Masaot / Clocks without Hands was premiered on May 6, 2015 by the Vienna Philharmonic under Daniel Harding in the Cologne Philharmonic .

Neuwirth's opera Orlando , based on the novel by Virginia Woolf , is the first full-length opera composed by a woman to be commissioned by the Vienna State Opera . The world premiere took place on December 8, 2019.

Awards

Compositions (selection)

Stage works

  • Kloing! and A songplay in 9 fits. Hommage à Klaus Nomi (2011) A music theater evening put together and staged by Olga Neuwirth
  • The Outcast - Homage to Herman Melville (2009–2011) Music installation theater with video
  • American Lulu (2006–2011) reinterpretation of Alban Berg's opera Lulu
  • Lost Highway (2002-2003) Lulu (opera)
  • Bählamms Fest (1997/98) Music theater in 13 pictures based on Leonora Carrington ; Libretto based on the translation by Heribert Becker by Elfriede Jelinek
  • Orlando (2019) Commissioned by the Vienna State Opera

Orchestral works

  • Trurliade - Zone Zero (2016) for percussion and orchestra
  • Masaot / Clocks without Hands (2013) for orchestra
  • … Miramondo multiplo… (2006) for trumpet and orchestra
  • anaptyxis (2000) for orchestra
  • Clinamen / Nodus (1999) for orchestra
  • Photophorus (1997) for two electric guitars and orchestra
  • Sans soleil (1994) distorting mirror for two Ondes Martenot, orchestra and live electronics

Ensemble works

  • Ishmaela's White World (2012) A footnote for soprano, small ensemble and playback sounds
  • Hommage à Klaus Nomi (2009) Version for chamber orchestra
  • Construction in space (2000) for 4 soloists, 4 ensemble groups and live electronics
  • The Long Rain - a video opera with surround-screens (1999/2000) for 4 soloists, 4 ensemble groups and live electronics based on a story by Ray Bradbury
  • Elfi and Andi (1997) for speaker, electric guitar, double bass, bass clarinet, saxophone and 2 CD playbacks. Text: Elfriede Jelinek

Chamber music

  • voluta / sospeso (1999) for basset horn, clarinet, violin, cello, percussion and piano
  • ... ad auras ... in memoriam H. (1999) for two violins and wooden drum ad lib.
  • settori (1999) 2nd string quartet
  • Ondate II (1998) for two bass clarinets
  • Akroate Hadal (1995) 1st string quartet

literature

  • Bettina Flitner : women with visions - 48 Europeans. With texts by Alice Schwarzer . Knesebeck, Munich 2004, ISBN 3-89660-211-X , pp. 154–157
  • Stefan Drees (Ed.): Olga Neuwirth. Between the chairs. A Twilight Song in search of the lost sound , Anton Pustet, Salzburg 2008

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Olga Neuwirth - Munzinger biography. Retrieved December 23, 2019 .
  2. ↑ Olga Neuwirth. In: Music and Gender on the Internet. University of Music and Theater, Hamburg, accessed on May 25, 2020 .
  3. ↑ Weekly magazine "Weststeirische Rundschau" from February 5, 2010, 83rd volume number 5, p. 1.
  4. ↑ a b State Prize to Olga Neuwirth. In: orf.at. Österreichischer Rundfunk, accessed on December 14, 2019 .
  5. ↑ Olga Neuwirth. In: Music and Gender on the Internet. Hamburg University of Music and Theater, accessed on December 23, 2019 .
  6. ↑ Bettina Flitner : Women with Visions - 48 European women. With texts by Alice Schwarzer . Knesebeck, Munich 2004, ISBN 3-89660-211-X , p. 156.
  7. ↑ a b Portrait: Ghost Sonata. In: profil.at. October 23, 2004, accessed December 23, 2019 .
  8. ↑ Bettina Flitner : Women with Visions - 48 European women. With texts by Alice Schwarzer . Knesebeck, Munich 2004, ISBN 3-89660-211-X , p. 156.
  9. ↑ a b Olga Neuwirth receives the Grand Austrian State Prize 2010. To: Austrian Press Agency APA. January 28, 2010, Channel: Culture. Broadcasters: Federal Ministry for Education, Art and Culture Vienna.
  10. ↑ Reinhard J. Brembeck: Interview with Olga Neuwirth: Androgynous Sounds. In: SZ Online. Süddeutsche Zeitung Digitale Medien GmbH, December 11, 2019, accessed on December 14, 2019 .
  11. ↑ Bayerischer Rundfunk: “Orlando” at the Vienna State Opera: Mercilessly well-intentioned. In: Bayerischer Rundfunk. December 10, 2019, accessed December 14, 2019 .
  12. ↑ Composer Olga Neuwirth receives a major Austrian state prize. In: The Standard . January 28, 2010.
  13. ↑ derStandard.at - German Music Prize goes to Olga Neuwirth APA announcement of December 16, 2009, accessed on December 18, 2014.
  14. ^ Vienna State Opera: Olga Neuwirth receives the Decoration of Honor for Science and Art. In: Small newspaper . December 5, 2019, accessed December 9, 2019 .
  15. ↑ Olga Neuwirth receives the Robert Schumann Prize for Poetry and Music 2020 , adwmainz.de, published and accessed on April 24, 2020.
personal data
SURNAME Neuwirth, Olga
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian composer
DATE OF BIRTH 4th August 1968
PLACE OF BIRTH Graz