Sundays at Noon: Matthias Lorenz

MATTHIAS LORENZ, cello
Programme:

Ian Wilson – A synder’d vastness (2021)

Alfred Holzhausen – NGC 7027 (2000)

Gráinne Mulvey – Rho Cassiopeiae (2022)

In 2019 I asked Ian Wilson to curate a solo recital about science for me. He accepted and also decided to write a piece for the evening, A synder’d vastness. As preparation he talked with cosmologists about the future development of the universe and the piece represents elements of this development in music. On the one hand the piece has clearly emotional aspects like a little melody inspired by the energy in the universe; on the other hand it follows a ra􏰀onal progression.

Covid changed a lot of my musical plans, so I had to pause my concerts and instead developed the “Musical Online Salon” and premiered Ian’s piece there in 2021. In the online audience was also Gráinne Mulvey and she decided to write a piece for me that I premiered one year later, also online – I’m pleased to play it for the first time facing a live audience today. Rho Cassiopeiae is a very unstable star and is deemed to be a candidate for a supernova; this instability is the core of Gráinne’s piece.

Having planned these two star-pieces for the program, it was easy to choose Alfred Holzhausen’s NGC 7027 as the final piece. And it also fits with the astronomical theme. Usually stars like our sun become (after billions of years) a planetary nebula – just like NGC 7027. These nebulae have rather short life􏰀mes (usually about 10,000 years). Still, Alfred treats it as something that tends to be eternal – but slowly vanishes in the end.

Rho Cassiopeiae demands a major detuning of the instrument, that’s why I am playing the programme in a different order than this description. ML