After two and a half years Ulrich Herkenhoff has finally returned to where his journey once begun: the Balkan, with its rich musical culture and its living sources of real folklore – maybe the last ones in Europe. With his own cycle Postcards from a Journey to Romania he pays reference to the art of improvisation and the wealth of melody of original Romanian ensembles. Romanian Dances are works by Bélá Bartók, the master of arrangements of Romanian and Hungarian folk melodies. Balkania is based on a folk song, which was documented by Marcel Cellier, the “spiritual
leader” of the famous ensemble “Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares“. And Parachkev Hadjev’s Twelve Bulgarian Folk Songs are here presented – like Bartók’s Romanian Dances – in an arrangement for pan flute and orchestra. The fascinating sound of Ulrich Herkenhoff’s instrument is here recorded in its purity on a multi-channel SA-CD. The SA-CD can be played on every standard CD player (in stereo).
Toshiyuki Kamioka
Toshiyuki Kamioka studied conducting, composition, piano and violin at the Con-servatory for Arts an Music in his hometown Tokyo. In 1982 he was awarded the Ataka-Pri-ze and received a scholarship of the Rotary International for the Hochschule für Musik in Hamburg, where he continued his studies. His .rst experiences at the theatre were as Ka-pellmeister at the Kiel Theatre and as First Ka-pellmeister a the Aalto-Theatre Essen. From 1996 to 2004, Toshiyuki Kamioka was General Music Director at the Hessian State Theatre in Wiesbaden, in 1997 he also became chief con-ductor of the „Nordwestdeutsche Philharmo-nie Herford“. In 1999 and 2000 he was director of the conductors’ forum of the Deutscher Mu-sikrat. Since 2004 Kamioka has been General Music Director in Wuppertal and in the same year he became professor for conducting at the Music Conservatory in Saarbrücken.
Henry Raudales
Henry Raudales was born in Guatemala and received his first violin lessons from his father at the age of four. Only three years later he made his debut as a soloist with with a Mendelssohn concerto in North Carolina, attracting the interest of Yehudi Menuhin, who recommended him for a scholarship
at his London School of Music. Further per-formances soon followed, such as several masterclasses and studies in Antwerp and London. He won numerous important prizes and made solo performances in the music centres of Europe, Asia and America. In 1992 he made a tour togehter with Nigel Kennedy, travelling to Belgium, France and England. His repertoire comprises more than 35 great solo concertos of the orchestra literature, ranging from Bach to Korngold.
Henry Raudales, who participated in nume-rous recordings of solo and chamber music as well as orchestral works, was First Concert Master of the Orchestra of the Vlaamse Opera in Antwerp/Gent from 1989 to 1993. He then held the same position at the Essen Philhar-monics. Since September 2001 he has been Concert Master of the Munich Radio Orches-tra. Henry Raudales plays a violin by Guada-gnini from 1787.
Balkan-Rhapsodie
Nach zweieinhalb Jahrzehnten ist Ulrich Herkenhoff nun wieder dort angekom-men, wo seine Reise einst begann: im Balkan, mit seiner reichen Musikkultur, seinen bis heute intakten Quellen echter Folklore – den vielleicht letzten in Europa. Als Vierzehn-jähriger war er diesem Phänomen erstmals begegnet, gänzlich unvorbereitet in einem Konzert. Seitdem hat ihn die balkanische Musik nicht mehr losgelassen, insbesondere die rumänische. Denn sie ist Dreh- und An-gelpunkt jenes Instrumentes, das Herkenhoff inzwischen auf den Konzertpodien rund um den Globus präsentiert, auf Tonträgern, Film-soundtracks, Symposien und Meisterkursen. Ohne die Musik des Balkan, dessen ist er sich sicher, gäbe es dieses Instrument nicht – zu-mindest nicht in der bestehenden Form. Erst die rumänische Musik, propagiert durch die in den Städten sesshaft gewordenen Zigeu-ner, hat dieses hochvirtuose Instrument her-vorgebracht. Schriftlos selbstverständlich, in bis heute ungebrochen vitaler Überlieferung. Die zahllosen Doinas, Ardeleanas, die Briuls, Sirbas und Geamparas mit ihrer rhythmischen Energie. Ulrich Herkenhoff hat viele von ihnen in seinem Repertoire, Seite an Seite mit sol-chen Werken, die man gemeinhin als „klas-sisch“ bezeichnet, nicht zuletzt aufgrund ihrer schriftlichen Existenz. Es mag erstaunen, dass Herkenhoff erst sehr spät selbst einen Fuß auf rumänisches Terrain gesetzt hat, nachdem er die Musik dieser Region lange schon aufgeso-gen zu haben schien in seiner Seele – so sehr, dass mancheiner bis heute nicht wahrhaben will, dass dieser Pan.ötist gebürtiger Deut-scher ist.
After two-and-a-half decades, Ulrich Herkenhoff has .nally returned to where his journey once began: in the Balkans, with its rich musical culture, its intact folklore – per-haps the last in Europe. He .rst encountered this phenomenon as a completely unprepared fourteen-year-old in a concert. Since then, the music of the Balkan has retained its hold on him, especially that of Romania. This music is the crux of the instrument that Herkenhoff presents on concert stages around the world, on recordings and .lm soundtracks, at sym-posia and master classes. Without the music of the Balkan – Herkenhoff is completely sure about this – his instrument would not exist, at least not in its known form. Romanian music, propagated by gypsies who had settled in the cities, was the source of this highly virtuosic instrument. They committed no music to paper, of course, and still pass on their many Doinas, Ardeleanas, Briuls, Sirbas and Geamparas – with their rhythmic energy – from one genera-tion or musician to the next. Ulrich Herkenhoff has many of these in his repertoire, alongside many works commonly designated as classi-cal, primarily because they have been written down. It may amaze the listener that Herken-hoff managed to get a foothold on Romanian soil at such a late date, after he had absorbed the music of this region so long it seemed to be in his genes – to such an extent that some people even today can hardly believe that this pan .utist was born in Germany.
This CD is the result of Herkenhoff’s fasci-nation. We begin with Béla Bartók – doubtless the most prominent of the treasure-seekers of Balkan tradition – a documentarist and creator in one. His famous Romanian Dances are stylized folklore in the best sense of the word. They leave the natural and primordial untouched, while simultaneously carrying the composer’s undeniable signature. And what could be more obvious than to return some of the original character to this natural phenom-enon by using the pan .ute?! In Herkenhoff’s arrangement, the pan .ute replaces the violin as the soloist.
The Romanian cultural landscape with its numerous regional accents is also the subject of Herkenhoff’s own Postcards of a Romanian Journey, which he modestly calls ‘arrange-ments’. They are based on decades of listening to the improvisations of Romanian ensembles whose discovery and fame go back to Swiss ethnomusicologist Marcel Cellier, without whom there would never have been the worldwide spread of the pan .ute and Romanian folklore nor the worldwide career of the ensemble “Le Mystere des Voix Bulgares”. But not only Ro-mania was a source of musical fascination for Cellier. As a traveling salesman for metal ore, he traveled for decades through Romania and the bordering Balkan countries, .nding time and again exotic musical jewels. He once brought a lullaby which became the basis of my Balkania: a simple melody, captured by a tape recorder – in the middle of nature, so to speak. Published as Disque Cellier No. 010, this recording lay peacefully in my record cabinet for years until suddenly experiencing painful currency through the most recent Balkan con.ict: a simple cradle-song, sung by a folksinger, without any accom-paniment. And this people was now standing at the edge of an unimaginable genocide. The heal-ing primeval opposed by the power of destruc-tion – these forces form the cornerstones of this composition, which not only uses Albanian ele-ments, but introduces rhythms and motives from other Balkan regions; a sort of program music.
With Parachkev Hadjiev’s Twelve Bulgar-ian Folksongs, Ulrich Herkenhoff and I return to our .rst CD production together, a duo-recording with pan .ute and piano. Similar to Bartók’s Romanian Dances, there is also an arrangement for violin and piano. And as with Bartók, these dance-like miniatures show true folk music qualities, paired with the compos-er’s individual character. The primary feature of these pieces is certainly their rhythmic va-riety, dominated by the typical Bulgarian pref-erence for asymmetrical rhythms using 5, 7 or 11 beats per measure, the latter being found, for example, in the Panagjoriste. Because these pieces were always so enthusiastically received in our duo setting, I have permitted myself to orchestrate them for this production of music for pan .ute and orchestra.
We dedicate this CD to our friend Marcel Cellier.
Matthias Keller