Klangspuren - NAMES ENSEMBLE

Few numbers have been so interwoven with meaning, legends and associations as the number 7: in Espacio 7, Angelica Castello explores the various dimensions and possibilities inherent in 7 as a symbol - seven seas, seven wounds, seven miracles, the Mater Dolorosa and her seven swords, and correspondingly seven instruments, seven musicians, seven tones, "seven, seven, seven". In addition to exploring the number, Castello wants to "reflect on pain, wounds and resilience", as she writes. Bernhard Lang's Game 17-4-7 Loops for E-Violin is the seventeenth piece in the Game series for Anne Lindenbaum and the NAMES ensemble. In it, the composer plays with musical structures and interactions - almost inevitably, it seems, the score is opened up to spontaneous decisions, indeterminacy and uncertainty. The piece is organised in rounds, like a card game: "The musicians choose from shuffled sets of cards and follow a set of rules," writes Lang. "The players' decisions are interdependent, mutually dependent. The resulting form of the piece remains variable in many aspects from performance to performance. Self-organisation of the system is the goal and the means of these strategies." Francesco Filidei also works playfully in his work Esercizio di Pazzia 1: the composer does not use classical instruments here, but balloons. Each instrumentalist is given seven balloons in four different colours (which they choose themselves) - the colours serve as the basis for the structure of the so-called "madness exercise". In contrast, Marco Döttlinger's work centres on maximum subtlety: minimal temporal changes, the smallest movements, movements with which he explores the boundary between standstill and movement.