Here we curate works of Universal Edition's new composers

New UE composers and works

General Probe 
Kammerorchesterbasel
März 2021

Nocturno Onirico für Streichorchester

Les Mains Nues by David Chaillou played by Moises Fernandez Via

A superb new double disc release of exciting and varied works by sixteen composers from around the world.

0—I. "Ohnami Monyou" (Wave Patterns) by Jenny Rompas

Sonata N° 6, op. 36, N° 8 (2020)
Catalogue 436
for Viola alone
Gabriel Mateos, viola
Vivo streaming
Teatro El Círculo
Rosario, Santa Fe
November 15, 2020

Sergio Parotti - Sonata N° 6, op. 36, N° 8

This album marks the start of the Mexican composer’s relationship with Signum Classics and highlights his musical and literary passions in performances by world-class soloists Kerenza Peacock, Laura van der Heijden, and Huw Watkins. Behold the Stars reached the Classical Billboard Charts and was highlighted by Apple Music as one of their Top 10 of the month.

The album’s title comes from the last line of Dante’s Inferno: “We then emerged to behold the stars again.” Reading this you can almost feel the freshness of freedom after the stifling pits of Hell have been traversed. The stars they emerge to behold are the ultimate goal of Dante’s journey; one he eventually reaches in Paradise. My love and fascination for Dante precede my Italian sojourn for a long, long time. So it happened that, as I was rereading Inferno’s last canto, I heard a chilling chant. That’s how A riveder le stelle, the title track of Behold the Stars, was born.

Piano Trio, R. 9: I. Allegro

Title: Daddy's homage
Composer: Nelly LiPuma
Pianoforte: Nelly LiPuma
Score: www.nellylipuma.com
Daddy's homage was written as a birthday present for my father, Pietro LiPuma, who loved jazz so much. From his residence in New York, during his youth, my father had brought to Italy a very precious collection of LPs with music by the greatest Jazz interpreters, from Benny Goodman to Ella Fitzgerarld, from Billie Holiday to Luis Armstrong.
This music that was then recorded also in single songs, in an LP that could contain from the Prelude in C # min. by Rachmaninof played by the composer himself to a piece by Dean Martin, was my musical nourishment for many years.
So, although I was a classical pianist, educated with Mozart, Beethoven and Chopin, I inherited from my father the taste for good jazz and the love for its syncopated rhythms and swing.
The premiere of Daddy's homag took place in Vienna with me at the piano.

Daddy's homage, for piano solo - Nelly  LiPuma, composer and pianist

Dimos Stephanidis, Twelve Bagatelles for Piano (2018)

Mezzo-soprano: Grace Maria Wain
Conductor: Jonathan Berman
Royal Scottish National Orchestra

Written as part of the RSNO's 'Composer's Hub' Vox Clamantis takes inspiration from a text by John Gower, written around the same time as the 1381 peasant's revolt. 

The significance of the peasant's revolt is it is arguably the first time people of Britain rose up with a class identity. 

Building upon this, the piece brings into question the importance of patriotism and popular struggle within Britain. Drawing upon texts by Niclas Y Glais (Rwyn Gweld O Bedd), Langston Hughes (Democracy), and the Moorsoldaten the piece shows us an optimistic vision of the future, the importance of fighting for it, and the final joy: 'One day we shall cry rejoicing homeland dear you are Mine at last'

Score available here: https://www.universaledition.com/ben-lunn-7871/works/vox-clamantis-31601

Vox Clamantis (2021)

Georg Streuber-Chraniuk, baritone
Markus Syperek, piano

The 'Kaddish' prayer is one of the central and best-known texts within Judaism. It is considered as a Jewish Prayer for the Dead and for Mourners and is recited at Jewish funerals as well as at the anniversaries of a death or at memorial events. Death and Mourning do not as such appear in the text; the Aramaic and Hebrew words speak more of a glorification of God and God's forthcoming Kingdom - words which should traditionally provide comfort for the mourners and strengthen them for their continuing lives.

The Kaddish has however also  a further function and is recited more frequently in traditional Jewish services; here it serves always as a division between different sections of the service text, as the conclusion of a reflection or meditation, and also as a form of transition and division between different themes. Special about the Kaddish is that it may only be used in a liturgical context when there is a 'Minyan' present, a quorum of at least ten Jewish adult males. 

Max Doehleman has now set this multi-layered traditional mourning song with the methodology of a Lied. The basic mood is melancholy, as is appropriate to the main theme - the setting should however not illustrate total hopelessness; the listener should instead experience a communication direct to the soul despite all the sense of loss and sorrow. A Kaddish that (as the prayer text itself indicates) reflects also the continuity of life and the cycle of arrival and departure. As well as the moment of grief the music can also beas an expression of transition or change.

Max Doehlemann: Kaddisch

By The Baltic Sea for piano and string orchestra .mp3

This piece is the second in a trilogy of works reflecting the life and work of the nature poet John Clare. In particular, it concerns his prose work 'Journey out of Essex' which describes his long walk home from an asylum in Epping Forest, and the music is an essay on the process of slowing music down (reflecting the poet's growing tiredness) and the need to maintain dramatic intensity (mimicking the poet's anxiety of returning home).

Shadows of Memory

Radmila Bocev, violina / violin
Božo Banović, klavir / piano

Recorded in 2007

Sheet music available at https://www.universaledition.com/en/Works/Robots/P0213639

Roboti / Robots

Written for and performed by the amazing Amy Turk.   

La Belle Noiseuse for solo harp

The piece is dedicated and performed to the italian guitarist Andrea Dieci

IN UNA RADA SCIA - 2012 (rev. 2016) - Universal Edition - guitar: Andrea Dieci

For Flute, Clarinet in Bb, piano, violin, cello

Unknown album (7/4/2016 2:41:3

Reverie(2014) Op.7  Mohammadreza Azin

Commissioned in 2012 to commemorate the centenary of the outbreak of the First World War, Timothy Hamilton’s Requiem draws its inspiration from the Roman liturgy. In twelve movements, it conjures up a vivid sequence of images depicting both the horror of war and the calmness and eeriness of the aftermath of battle, interspersed with moments of sombre and contemplative reflection most notably in the plangent setting of Isaac Watts’ Give us the wings of faith [1] and the orchestral interlude Lest We Forget [9]. The work builds to a powerful and moving conclusion with soprano and then chorus welcoming the souls of the fallen into paradise.

Hamilton Requiem Demo Sampler

Performed by John Ziarko, viola, and Rodney Lister, piano

Lister BU March 24, 2014

The Bear's Lullaby

Composed by Juan Arroyo and played by Omar Nicho.
Live at Quipu 2019, Paris

1. Evil Man

Bence Hartl: Variations on a Theme of Liszt - (M)aradi szvit

for solo guitar

I. Szechenyi
II. Blackwell
III. Bott

This piece was composed as a part of a mixed-media project inspired by the hungarian revolution and the political events of 1848-49. The piece varies a theme from Franz Liszt's Historical Portraits No. 1 (R. 112). 

Performed by Dora Cserenyec
Recorded and mixed by Sandor Arok

Graphic art video by Jenõ Lévay available at:

https://youtu.be/MQdeNQL_xjI

Budapest, 2020

I. Szechenyi

El Público (2014) . Cuadro Quinto, Escena Segunda
© Copyright 2014 by Proyecto Sotelo Sotelo S. L., Madrid-Berlin

Teatro Real – Madrid | 03/2015
Gun-Brit Barkmin- Señora Enlutada 
Klangforum Wien, Pablo Heras-Casado- conductor

Recording- BelAir Classiques