Nicholas Collon with Gertraud and Friedrich Cerha after the performance of Like a Tragicomedy at the Auditorio Nacional de Música in Madrid on 7 April. As you can see, they were very happy with the performance.

You can read about – and listen to an excerpt of – Like a Tragicomedy on our homepage.

We wish you all the best!

Find out more about Friedrich Cerha.

Friedrich Cerha. Ernst von Siemens Music Prize recipient 2012.

Happy Birthday Friedrich Cerha!

(Another anniversary for the 17th February is the world première of Mahler’s Das klagende Lied, which took place in 1901)

We’re off to the Konzerthaus in Vienna tonight for the latest concert in Klangforum Wien’s IKONEN series.

Under the title Vexations, Klangforum presents a rich programme of UE works:

Pierre Boulez: Mémoriale | ( ... explosante-fixe ... Originel)
Morton Feldman: Instruments 2
Beat Furrer: Time out 1 and 2
Friedrich Cerha: Bruchstück, geträumt

as well as Olga Neuwirth’s ... miramondo multiplo ...

Jean Deroyer conducts, Eva Furrer and Anders Nyqvist are the soloists.

If you are in Boston tonight, go and see Sound Icon perform Georg Friedrich Haas’ ethereal 70-minute in vain at the Institute of Contemporary Art (audio sample on this page).

If you are not in Boston tonight, listen live on BBC Radio 3 (7:30pm London time) to the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra performing Friedrich Cerha’s Wiener Kaleidoskop – a romp around Vienna’s musical traditions (audio sample on this page).

For those looking for something else for a Friday evening, there’s Rihm in Saarbrücken (COLL’ARCO), Weill in Graz (Threepenny Opera), Janacek in Munich (Glagolitic Mass) and Reims (Jenufa), Schreker in Cologne (Chamber Symphony), Borisova-Ollas in Gothenburg (The Kingdom of Silence), Mahler in Bangkok (Symphony No. 9), Birtwistle in London (Linoi), Zemlinsky in Valencia (Lyric Symphony), Kodály in Arnhem (Dances of Galanta), Oldfield in Neuenkirchen (Tubular Bells), Bartók in Athens (Miraculous Mandarin), Berio in Düsseldorf (Rendering) …

See the full list of today’s performances here

The RSO Vienna performs under Johannes Kalitzke tonight at the Wien Modern festival.

The first half of the concert consists of orchestral miniatures, including excerpts of Francis Burt’s Morgana, Johannes Maria Staud’s ‘Eck’ from his work Polygon and Friedrich Cerha’s Momente.

After the interval, Harrison Birtwistle’s 30-minute The Triumph of Time will be performed.

The concert is broadcast on ORF Radio 1 on Friday 4 November at 19:30 Vienna time.

The Gewandhausorchester is in Vienna this week with its chief conductor Riccardo Chailly. For full details of the continuing tour of their Beethoven series, see the Gewandhaus website.

Tonight, they present the Austrian première of Friedrich Cerha’s Paraphrase on the beginning of Beethoven’s 9th Symphony.

Listen to an excerpt here

Friedrich Cerha’s opera Baal opens tonight at the Neue Oper in Vienna.

See our news item here.

Shooting Star Martin Grubinger performs Friedrich Cerha’s Concerto for Percussion tonight and tomorrow in Leipzig. Riccardo Chailly conducts the Gewandhausorchester.

Reviewing the world première for the Neue Musikzeitung, Gerhard Rohde wrote:

“The richness of rhythmic finesse and complexity is astounding, giving the work an overwhelming physical liveliness. The sophisticated sound that Cerha invents for both the orchestral part and for the formidable percussion ensemble is also fascinating.”

Here’s a brief postscript to the many obituaries for Robert Tear. I read in the Guardian and the Telegraph that he had sung in the world première of Lulu in 1979, with the new third act by Friedrich Cerha.

After a brief glance into the hallowed UE archive folders, I found the Observer’s review of the première, where Tears’ “absorbing performance” as the painter is commended.

This Thursday, Friedrich Cerha turns 85. Among the celebrations is a concert dedicated to his honour at the Vienna Konzerthaus.

Various articles have already been spotted in the Austrian press, such as Die Presse, Der Standard and also at the ORF.

My colleagues have just made this poster to be displayed at the Mayrische Musikalienhandlung in Salzburg this spring, where Friedrich Cerha will be awarded the Music Prize of the State of Salzburg.