Katana VentraIP

Sirius (Stockhausen)

Sirius: eight-channel electronic music and trumpet, soprano, bass clarinet, and bass is a music-theatre composition by Karlheinz Stockhausen, composed between 1975 and 1977. It is Nr. 43 in the composer's catalogue of works, and lasts 96 minutes in performance.

North (bass): Earth, Man, Night, Winter, Seed

East (trumpet): Fire, Youth, Morning, Spring, Bud

South (soprano): Water, Woman, Midday, Summer, Blossom

West (bass clarinet): Air, Friend/Beloved, Evening, Autumn, Fruit.

Sirius is Number 43 in the composer's catalog of works, and consists of three main parts: "Presentation", "The Wheel" (subdivided into four sections, corresponding to the four seasons), and "Annunciation". The words were written by Stockhausen, except for a text by Jakob Lorber used in the Annunciation. The musical material consists of the twelve zodiac melodies of Tierkreis, Nr. 41½ (1974–75), originally composed for music boxes in connection with the percussion sextet Musik im Bauch (Music in the Belly), Nr. 41 (1975). Four of these melodies are principal, each associated with one of the protagonists, and are subjected to a variety of transformations, not merely by superimposition even of metamorphosis through a system of cross-fertilization processes in which "one melody progressively assumes the features of another, as a series of mists and frosts 'borrowed' from winter will gradually transform the autumnal aspect of October from summer nostalgia into winter foreboding".[7] The remaining eight melodies serve a subsidiary role. In the Presentation, the four characters introduce themselves and their attributes. They are:


The main, central "wheel" lasts over an hour, and can be rotated, according to the season of the performance, to produce four different forms:


The total duration of Sirius is 96 minutes.


The eight-channel electronic music was realized in the Electronic Music Studio of WDR, Cologne in 1975–77, using an EMS Synthi 100 synthesizer. The electronic music can be performed by itself, without the four soloists, and there are also three excerpted versions, each for a soloist with a specially prepared version of the electronic music: Aries, for trumpet (Nr. 43½, 1980), Libra, for bass clarinet (Nr. 43⅔), and Capricorn, for bass voice (Nr. 43¾).

Aries, for trumpet and electronic music. , trumpet. Stockhausen Complete Edition CD 33 (with Klavierstück XIII: Luzifers Traum, as piano solo).

Markus Stockhausen

Capricorn, for bass voice and electronic music. , bass. Stockhausen Complete Edition CD 59 (with Rechter Augenbrauentanz for clarinets, bass clarinets, percussionist, synthesizer player).

Nicholas Isherwood

Libra, for bass clarinet and electronic music. , bass clarinet. In Music for Clarinet, Bass Clarinet, and Basset-horn. 3-CD set. Stockhausen Complete Edition CD 32.

Suzanne Stephens

Sirius, electronic music with trumpet, soprano, bass clarinet and bass voice (Summer version). Markus Stockhausen, trumpet; Annette Merriweather, soprano; Suzanne Stephens, bass clarinet; , bass. Deutsche Grammophon 2-LP set 2707 122 (1980). Reissued on 2-CD set, Stockhausen Complete Edition, CD 26.

Boris Carmeli

Sirius, electronic music in 4 versions: Spring version, Summer version, Autumn version, Winter version) 8-CD set, Stockhausen Complete Edition CD 76.

Ball, Malcolm. 1997. " ". Avant no. 5.

Licht aus Stockhausen

Britton, Peter. 1985. "Stockhausen's Path to Opera". 126, No. 1711 (September): 515–521.

The Musical Times

Kurtz, Michael. 1992. Stockhausen: A Biography, translated by . London and Boston: Faber and Faber. ISBN 0-571-14323-7 (cloth) ISBN 0-571-17146-X (pbk).

Richard Toop

Tannenbaum, Mya. 1987. Conversations with Stockhausen, translated from the Italian by David Butchart. Oxford: Clarendon Press; New York: Oxford University Press.  0-19-315467-6.

ISBN

Stockhausen, Karlheinz. 1989. Towards a Cosmic Music, selected and translated by Tim Nevill. Longmead (Shaftsbury, Dorset): Element Books.  1-85230-084-1.

ISBN

. 1977. "An Interview with Karlheinz Stockhausen ". Perspectives of New Music 16, no. 1 (Fall–Winter): 85–101.

Felder, David

Frisius, Rudolf. 2008. Karlheinz Stockhausen II: Die Werke 1950–1977; Gespräch mit Karlheinz Stockhausen, "Es geht aufwärts". Mainz, London, Berlin, Madrid, New York, Paris, Prague, Tokyo, Toronto: Schott Musik International.  978-3-7957-0249-6.

ISBN

Hollings, Ken. 1999. " : Karlheinz Stockhausen in Conversation with Ken Hollings, Kurten, Germany, 12 March 1999". The Wire, no. 184 (May).

Lost in the Stars

. 1980. "Musical Events: Seven Days' Wonder". The New Yorker (25 August): 78–81.

Kenyon, Nicholas

. 2005. Other Planets: The Music of Karlheinz Stockhausen. Lanham, Maryland, Toronto, Oxford: The Scarecrow Press. ISBN 0-8108-5356-6.

Maconie, Robin

Manion, Michael. [2000]. "". Stockhausen.org website (Accessed 3 April 2012). Archived 16 September 2008 at the Wayback Machine

From Tape Loops To MIDI—Stockhausen's 40 Years of Electronic Music

Stockhausen, Karlheinz. 1978. "Sirius, Elektronische Musik und Trompete, Sopran, Baßklarinette, Baß (1975–77)". In his Texte zur Musik 4, edited by , 301–329. DuMont Dokumente. Cologne: DuMont Buchverlag. ISBN 3-7701-1078-1.

Christoph von Blumröder

. 2000. "Von der 'Sternenmusik' zur Musik des Weltraums: Karlheinz Stockhausens musikalischer Kosmos". Neue Zeitschrift für Musik 161, no. 6 (November–December): 38–43.

Toop, Richard

by Albrecht Moritz.

Essay on Sirius

by Ingvar Loco Nordin.

Review of Sirius CD