Heinz Holliger

The complete edition of Robert Schumann's symphonic works with the WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne under Heinz Holliger is now available as a 6 album set.

In February 2021, when public concerts had been cancelled for several months, the musicians of the Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne were able to meet behind closed doors on the stage of the Opéra de Lausanne in order to record this disc under the direction of Heinz Holliger. An album released in 2013 presented an earlier recording collaboration between the Bernese conductor and the Lausanne-based ensemble with two works by Schoenberg ( Verklärte Nacht and the Chamber Symphony No. 2 ) and an early piece by his pupil Anton Webern ( Langsamer Satz ).

The Swiss oboist, composer and conductor Heinz Holliger is without doubt one of the "grand old men" of the European classical music scene. Now in his 83rd year, the busy all-round musician is still bursting with verve, curiosity and the desire to make music. His latest album is called "Les Roseaux Chantants" ("The Singing Reed Flutes"), an allusion to the double reed with which the notes on the oboe and the cor anglais are made to sound. Works were chosen that were composed for the unusual combination of two oboes plus English horn. A tonally attractive combination, as the works by Beethoven, Wranitzky, the Swiss composer Rudolph Ganz and, last but not least, Heinz Holliger himself, impressively demonstrate.

Heinz Holliger’s “dream opera” Lunea which was premiered, to great acclaim, at Opernhaus Zurich, interweaves strands from the life and mind of Nikolaus Franz Niembsch (1802-1850), the Hungarian-born Austrian poet who wrote under the name Nikolaus Lenau. Lenau’s last, fragmentary writings have fired Holliger’s imagination and led to the creation of an intricately inventive work with a marvellously evocative lead role for baritone Christian Gerhaher. Neue Zürcher Zeitung: “Here Gerhaher can display his full sensitivity in dealing with the finest nuances of language and bring to bear his almost unlimited spectrum of tonal-dynamic gradations in the intonation. The poet Lenau speaks most directly from the sounds and notes…”

A recording to delight all admirers of Bach and the baroque oboe and a wonderful account of Heinz Holliger’s interpretive genius as a player: for many, he is the world’s greatest oboist. Factor in the long-established relationship between the Camerata Bern and Holliger which permits a real group understanding, Erich Hobarth’s exemplary violin, and superb ECM sound and we have here a special event. Holliger has recorded prolifically for the New Series, but this is his first disc for the label since the 1997 “Zelenka” album to address core classical repertoire, and these very popular pieces will find a broad public response.

Quite amazing what astonishing musical colours and sound effects an ensemble of three reed instruments can achieve. To be heard on the new album with Swiss music legend Heinz Holliger. The title »Les Roseaux Chantants», the »singing reeds», refers to the double reed through which the oboe and cor anglais (and also the bassoon) are blown to set the air vibrating and produce sounds. Works by Ludwig van Beethoven, the Swiss composer Rudolph Ganz (1877-1972), Anton Wranitzky and Heinz Holliger. A fascinating sound and musical experience.

The Herman Krebbers Edition offers the most comprehensive collection ever issued of the recorded art of Herman Krebbers (1923–2018) featuring the great Dutch violinist as concerto soloist, chamber musician and concert master and issued to mark the centenary of his birth.

In February 2015 Heinz Holliger conducted a performance of Schubert’s “Unfinished” Symphony with the Basel Chamber Orchestra. The result was so compelling that Holliger and the orchestra decided to record all the symphonies, together with a selection of Schubert’s operatic overtures. The project began in 2017 and is scheduled to end in 2019.

Zwiegespräche is a meeting of spirits. “We compose the same way,” said György Kurtág to Heinz Holliger on hearing this recording, which emphasises works for oboe by these two major composers. Both of them reference the entire history of music in their pieces, both incorporate dedications and messages to friends and colleagues in the fabric of their work, and both draw upon literature as an inspirational source. Both, moreover, love the miniature as an expressive form; short pieces by Kurtág and Holliger are interwoven.

audite is delighted to present the third volume of the complete orchestral works by Robert Schumann. This series comprises all the symphonies (including both versions of the Fourth Symphony in D minor) as well as all the overtures and concertos. Featuring the Cello Concerto and the second version of the D minor Symphony, this CD presents two major works that Schumann composed and revised during his time as music director in Duesseldorf. In both works, the movements of the classical model merge into one another without interruption.