Premiere location: Szeged
Premiere date: 1989.05.26.
Premiere performers: Salieri Chamber Orchestra conducted by Tamás Pál
Composition end date: 1979
Revision location: Verőce
Revision date: 1989.09.02.
Genre: Orchestra
Instrumentation: guitar solo, oboe, clarinet, bass clarinet, horn, trumpet, trombone, tuba, timpani, upright piano, celesta, harp, vibraphone, tubular bell, cimbalom, leg cymbal, gong, tam-tam, bass drum, viola, violoncello, double bass, whistle, harmonium / harpsichord, signal [allarmi]
Duration (minutes): 10
Year of publication: 2004
Publisher: Universal Edition/Editio Musica Budapest
Publication number: Z. 13813
The work consists of a single movement.
It is an instrumental work with no text.
Grabstein für Stephan is a 1989 version, arranged for guitar and chamber ensemble, of a funeral piece originally written for guitar, harp, piano, trombone, and flute, which appears in the appendix to the unpublished guitar pieces cataloged as Op. 15 and composed in the late 1970s. The work pays tribute to the memory of Stephan Stein (1902–1976), the husband of art psychologist Marianne Stein (1913–1994), who worked with Kurtág in Paris. At the core of the musical texture is a choral-like sequence of guitar chords occasionally completed or interrupted by chordal or melodic commentaries of other groups of instruments. An essential element of the composition is the placing of various groups of instruments at different points of the room. Thus, space functions as a type of acoustic filter, similarly to the majority of Kurtág’s instrumental pieces around 1990. The physical distance at which the notes and the groups of notes sound is of decisive importance. The music produced farther away is not necessarily softer because its energy is felt: we are aware that even if it sounds farther away it is of great intensity. What sounds closer, on the other hand, is not necessarily the most important at the given moment of the process. It is as if space were observed through lenses of differing magnifying forces or if the air around us were felt thicker or thinner by our skin. It depends on the nature of the musical texture whether we still take notice of the directions or we are captivated by the sound that suddenly fills the room (as, for example, at the dynamic climax of the piece when gas horns and whistles join). Grabstein für Stephan represents an exceptional phase in Kurtág’s lifework. Even if he has compositions of similar tone (for example in the series Games for piano) or similar solutions (in some of the other pieces of op. 15 or the Twelve Microludes for string quartet) the relaxed mood and the narrative character of Grabstein stand without precedence. It seems as if a composition of aphoristic brevity were enlarged here. The gestures are more extended, with much more time left for them. In this way, the larger form does not emerge as constructed from mosaics but viewed from the angle of the whole as the attention focuses on one or another motif.
(via EMB)
No sheet music files available for this piece.
Reviews of the World Premiere
Review by N.N.
(Délmagyarország, October 28, 1989)
[…] This year, music lovers in Szeged were treated to a rich and wide-ranging program. Among the world premieres, György Kurtág’s Grabstein für Stephan stood out, featuring a massive ensemble and unusual instruments ranging from the pioneer whistle to the steam whistle, heard in Hungary for the first time. The orchestra’s placement was also interesting; in addition to the stage, musicians were seated on the sides, at the back, and on the balcony of the concert hall, so the audience encountered unexpected effects from all directions. […]
(Délmagyarország 79 [1989]/256, 4.)
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Review by László Gönczy
(Muzsika, January 1990)
[…] Few orchestras have the opportunity to be the first to perform a work by an artist of György Kurtág’s stature at their debut concert. The title of his piece, composed for this occasion, says little yet suggests much: Grabstein für Stephan – In memoriam Stephan Stein. The relationship to the past unfolds here in a far more complex manner than in the works discussed earlier: the motivations behind the composition and the personal experiences that shaped it remain hidden from us, yet there is no doubt about the searing, self-consuming personal nature of the expression – as we might consider natural within Kurtág’s creative world. The uniquely composed ensemble – strings, three woodwinds, seven brass instruments, guitar, piano, harmonium, a vast arsenal of percussion, various whistles, and gas horns – clearly divides into two layers: a “human–civilizational–value-preserving” underlying tone and a series of “aggressive–primitive” effects that overwhelm and tear it apart. The listener almost identifies with the former and, under the impact of brutality surging from multiple points in the hall, is confronted with an experience bordering on physical annihilation. The work’s message requires no verbal explanation for contemporary audiences. Despite the performance’s compromises, it fulfilled its mission by conveying this message to those present.
(Muzsika 33 [1990]/1, 7.)
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Reviews of the Budapest Premiere
Review by Péter Várnai
(Magyar Hírlap, November 9, 1991)
[…] The highlight of the concert was undoubtedly György Kurtág’s relatively recent piece, Grabstein für Stefan. I cannot decide whether Kurtág has written a more beautiful work in his career to date, and here I am using the term “beautiful” in the spirit of classical aesthetics. Whether he has or not is not important. What matters is that Grabstein’s poetry and delicate lyricism are indeed rare in the music of our time. The work is mourning music that rises from the depths and, in fact, says it all. Structurally, the guitar chord that opens the piece serves as the foundation of everything; the entire musical material is derived from it. What is perhaps unusual is that this time Kurtág was not content with a small ensemble; it consists of more than thirty musicians, some of whom are scattered throughout the concert hall. The success was immense and well deserved. Both Peskó, who perfectly captured the spirit of the piece, and the brilliant ensemble merited the prolonged applause.
(Magyar Hírlap 24 [1991]/263, 6.)
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Review by Zoltán Farkas
(Magyar Nemzet, November 18, 1991)
[…] The Scharoun Ensemble, one of the Berlin Philharmonic’s chamber ensembles, rounded out the orchestra’s guest appearance in Budapest with an afternoon concert of contemporary music. Boulez, Schnittke, Kurtág, and Ligeti – this distinguished list of names shows that the chamber ensemble had curated its program from the forefront of European composition. In terms of the quality of the compositions and the performance, this single concert offered more value than the ten-day “Music of Our Time” series held in October. […] Perhaps our bias can be excused if we devote most of our attention to György Kurtág’s Grabstein für Stephan, Op. 15c. At first listen, this composition appears to differ greatly from the composer’s earlier works. An external feature – the monumental ensemble, by Kurtág’s standards – also seems to emphasize this distinction. Looking one level deeper, however, the common thread connecting Grabstein to the rest of his oeuvre becomes clear: a courageous confrontation with extremes – or, for lack of a better word, drama. It is this trait that makes Kurtág’s works “important” and compels us to take a stand. European music reached its pinnacle of expression – in depicting the depths of the soul – sometime in the first decades of this century. Kurtág continues to push the boundaries at this level. When, in Grabstein’s pleasant, ear-caressing “everyday” music, the middle section suddenly bursts forth with a screech never heard before, the effect is startling and deeply moving. It is as if the forbidden seventh door of fairy tales – the chamber of horrors – were to open for a moment and then vanish yet leave an indelible impression on the listener. Let us hope we will have many more opportunities to marvel at this “Gravestone” with a shiver of awe.
(Magyar Nemzet 54 [1991]/270, 9.)
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Review by Antal Boronkay
(Muzsika, January 1992)
[…] In early November, the highlight of Budapest’s music scene was undoubtedly the performance by the Berlin Philharmonic; nevertheless, a smaller segment of the music profession focused its attention on the concert by the Scharoun Ensemble, a chamber group formed from members of the Philharmonic (November 3). This curiosity was partly directed at the ensemble itself, given that world-class performances of contemporary music are not very common here. At the same time, the program was likely appealing, particularly the Kurtág piece Grabstein für Stephan, which was being performed in Budapest for the first time. (The world premiere took place in Szeged in October 1989 and was performed by members of the Szeged Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Tamás Pál.) The artistry of the chamber orchestra led by Zoltán Peskó was truly impressive. In all four pieces on the program, the ensemble demonstrated exceptional tonal precision which, combined with a high level of chamber music artistry, produced a sound quality that is rarely heard. It was not the performance that caused Ligeti’s Chamber Concerto and Schnittke’s Dialogue for Cello and Seven Instruments to be somewhat overshadowed by Boulez’s Mémorial and Kurtág’s work, the latter of which deservedly garnered the greatest audience acclaim of the evening.
Grabstein für Stephan – according to Fritz Hannenberg’s program notes – appears in Kurtág’s catalog as an appendix to the 1978 collection of guitar pieces, Op. 15. However, this work – written for guitar, harp, piano, trombone, and flute – remained a fragment; it was never performed, and it was not until ten years later that the composer decided to write a version involving more than thirty performers. At that point, Grabstein was designated Op. 15c (Op. 15b had previously become A kis csáva).
In recent years, Kurtág’s focus has shifted increasingly from vocal works to purely instrumental music requiring a larger ensemble. His interest in this direction is exemplified by works such as …quasi una fantasia… (1988), Op. 27, No. 2 (Double Concerto) (1989–90), and Grabstein für Stephan. Although his most recent work, What is the Word – based on a text by Beckett and premiered in Vienna under Abbado’s baton – is vocally conceived, it too features a multi-instrumental ensemble. The cohesion of his work to date and the continuity of his style are also evident in the way Kurtág repeatedly draws on his earlier pieces and sketches, incorporating them as organic material into his new compositions. Regarding the interconnections among his works, it is worth pointing out the links between Grabstein and Kurtág’s earlier memorial pieces (Omaggio a L. Nono, Three Old Inscriptions, Requiem for the Beloved). In this regard, however, there is a significant difference: Grabstein für Stephan (subtitled In memoriam für Stephan Stein) is not merely memorial music but, in its tone, is unambiguously funeral music, almost a funeral march. The steady, pulsating beats of the bass drum, kettledrum, and other percussion instruments – with their varying characters and tempos – sometimes evoke the image of a slow march and at other times serve as tolling bells. The ringing of bells, as the acoustic backdrop of a funeral ceremony, is associated with the work in many ways, but most strikingly in the guitar chord that opens and closes the piece and remains latently present throughout. This motif – the chord played as an arpeggio on the guitar’s open strings, with variations created by changing one note at a time – is the key to Grabstein’s musical concept and tonal system. An “objet trouvé” – a found object – that is inanimate matter in and of itself, but into which the creator – in both senses of the word “Schöpfer” – breathes life by placing it in a precisely arranged environment and endowing it with a function. The genius of the piece, of course, lies in the way it transforms an object with a completely neutral sound into something essential through supreme imagination and musical empathy.
The large chamber music ensemble was spread throughout the space, with two smaller groups of instruments on the side balconies and most of the musicians onstage. Because of the unique instrumentation, the purpose of the many instruments is not to achieve tutti fortissimo passages, but quite the opposite: to blend the most delicate, most translucent timbres. For example, the guitar chord is at times accompanied by the piano, harp, harmonium, and celesta, which transforms even a banal harmonic pattern into a sonorous texture rich in overtones. Throughout the piece, whenever the guitar chord recedes into the background and the “con dolore” motif in the strings initiates the intensification, we encounter numerous examples of sounds blended with extraordinary precision, whose exact proportions and balance are masterfully realized by the Scharoun Ensemble.
The large-scale dramaturgy of Grabstein is nothing less than a domed arch, with its apex situated around the middle of the work, from which the musical material gradually unfolds to the conclusion, which echoes the opening. The tension of the composition, however, is linear from the first beat to the last; the formal articulation, dynamic contrasts, mass of primarily linear, intertwining sustained notes, and metrical pulsation ensure that the work’s impact is never lost for a single moment. In fact, all the qualities that animate Kurtág’s vocal style are present here as well, although they emerge in a different musical medium. The master of aphoristic concision unfolds his emotional reflections in Grabstein into a single, great musical sigh, and these gestures cohere into a unified tonal whole. Kurtág’s embrace of grand forms and sonic dimensions is extremely welcome for the diversity of his oeuvre and the more varied manifestations of his compositional imagination. Through this inner renewal, he not only expands his expressive range but also enriches us as listeners.
(Muzsika 35 [1992]/1, 39–40.)
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Katalin Fittler’s review
(Kritika, 1992)
[…] For me, the second orchestral evening meant more, and, to top it all off, I derived the greatest enjoyment from the chamber concert.
It was obvious from the start: the orchestra’s members are musicians trained as soloists, which is why, thanks to their large numbers, their performance is so powerful. In addition to their skill, their dedication is also worthy of soloists. The chamber music evening, with four contemporary works on the program, confirmed this for me. The greatest anticipation surrounded György Kurtág’s work Grabstein für Stefan, Op. 15c, which we heard for the first time in the capital. And rightly so: the composition, entrusted to more than 30 performers, is of poignant beauty. It will continue to reach listeners in its entirety through live performances, where the full potential of the spatial possibilities is truly realized. […] This concert, then, felt like a kind of “Music of Our Time” gala. It is musical celebrations like this that truly popularize music; it is at moments like these that we undoubtedly discover the place and function of contemporary music in our lives.
(Kritika [1992]/2, 46.)
No sheet music files available for this piece.
