Robert Schumanns "Kerner-Lieder" op. 35 are a beauty of endless black depression.... The breathing of Death.. like in Franz Schubert's "Winterrreise". With musical and quasi-psychological commentaries (using the idioms of Contemporary music) the composer developed a TRAUMREISE - DREAM JOURNEY.... and suddenly you feel very close to Robert Schumann and his lyrical pain and despair!

After the first premiere of his famous Septet op. 20 Beethoven said with boldness to his colleague Joseph Haydn (who just got extremely popular with his oratio „The Creation“): „This is my Creation!“. So we know that Beethoven has seen his Septet as a musical document for „nature“ and „creation“… written in the key Eb-Major, - which has been a symbol for „nature“. The following composition combines motifs and themes from op. 20 with texts by Beethoven and lyrics of J.W. von Goethe, which are addressing the world of nature. - Worldpremiere at "45. Fränkische Musiktage" Alzenau / Vokal Art Francfort am Main, with opening speech by Monika Grütters, Minister for Culture of German Federal Republic

The 35-minute "Symphony of Peace" in four movements provides a meeting place for prayers and philosophies from Western-Christian and Eastern-Islamic cultural circles, demonstrating that despite all divisive preconceptions, the common denominator is the desire for peace and thanksgiving for all creation and the one shared creator. Christian and Islamic prayer structures and invocations are interspersed with poetry by Mevlana Dschalaladdin Rumi, Nâzım Hikmet, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Fürst Pückler-Muskau in a sweeping symphonic structure (with identical musical forces to Beethoven’s 9th Symphony which will also be performed).

The 3rd SINFONY "CHINESE SEASONS" for alto, sheng and orchestra is a lyrical symphony in which a bridge is built between German and Chinese culture: the connecting elements are the magnificent transcriptions of Chinese poetry by Hans Bethge (1876-1946), sung by the alto, as well as the sound worlds of the "Sheng", the millennia-old Chinese mouth organ, whose wealth of colours, from quietly vibrating monophony to explosively expansive polyphony, is fascinatingly exploited by the soloist WuWei. - A CD recording with Vesselina Kasarova (mezzo-soprano), WuWei (Sheng) and the Tonkünstlerorchester Österreich conducted by Xincao LI.

The Epic of Gilgamesh is about 5,000 years old, exists in eleven ancient Babylonian cuneiform tablets and is one of the oldest literary texts in verse form. Since it refers to original Sumerian versions (also in cuneiform), its origins are still very much in the dark. If one takes into account the pre-Eastronautical research of the extraterrestrial "gods" of the Anunaki, which is now seriously documented, one enters a fascinating no-man's land that deals with the creation of man and the developmentally erratic and still inexplicable beginning of culture - astronomical, medical and mathematical knowledge indicate a high level of knowledge of a civilisation before the Flood, which is also archaeologically documented. The Heidelberg assyrologist Stefan Maul is an international luminary with his chair and has translated and commented on the Gilgamesh epic in an epoch-making new way. Without venturing onto the scientific slippery slope of many obvious speculations, his research and commentaries are objectively assured: thus, in any case, the certainty remains that the Babylonian-Sumerian account of the Flood as the focus of the Gilgamesh Epic represents the older blueprint for the biblical version: the archetype of the biblical Noah is the Uta-Napishti presented here.

The world is round! - Everything turns".... Is this Latin text from the "CARMINA BURANA" and is deliberately linked to the "Wheel of Fortuna" in Orff's work. ORBE ROTUNDO is not only a wild, ecstatic "sister work" with the same cast as Carl Orff's "Carmina", - but also a vital stage work that literally evokes a staging as an opera or a ballet: in addition to the Latin texts, there are erotic and sometimes frivolously obscene medieval lyrics by Neidhart von Reuenthal, for example, magic spells, cabbalistic formulas, cruel passages from witchcraft books..... The colourful and plump life here knows no bounds... from the onomatopoeic imitation of animals to requiem texts, booze songs or ritual ecstatic dances.... Striking choral passages alternate with intimate lyricism. Archaic woodcut-like orchestrations stand next to fragrant clouds of sensitive sound. An orgy of sensuality...not only in the lyrics!

"Counterpoints" in Krasnoyarsk, a Siberian centre which geographically forms almost the centre of Asia: Composition commissions for two festivals, the "Transsiberian Art Festival" in April 2019 and the festival "Asia - Siberia - Europe" in September 2019. One for chamber orchestra - one for symphony orchestra. Once the natural world of the archaic world of Siberia - once the artificial world of Mozart's opera. In the first work, the double bass from art music (played by Artem Chirkov, the soloist of the St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra) and the double bass balalaika, which seems almost exotic in such a context (played by Mikhail Dzyudze, a jack-of-all-trades from folklore to the electric bass of rock music) are juxtaposed. - In the other work, Reinhold Friedrich combines three highly contrasting registers of the trumpet and plays the flugelhorn, the trumpet and the high piccolo trumpet, which fathom the depths and are contrasts that can hardly be mastered from a technical point of view. BUT: the contrasts - as with the plus/minus pole of electricity - are the source of voltage and suspense. Yes, - consistently creating suspense and taking the listener on a journey marked by contrasts is the intention of this CD compilation