“To write a poem after Auschwitz is barbaric.”
Theodor W. Adorno’s fateful verdict, formulated in the immediate aftermath of the war, is all too understandable: the omnipresence of Nazi horror had left humanity breathless.

Today, nearly a century later, large parts of our society have lost both historical awareness and knowledge of our past, as well as the willingness to acknowledge facts. In an age of fake news and conspiracy theories, it has become one of art’s foremost responsibilities to keep the memory of what has happened alive — and to serve as a warning. From this perspective, it now seems legitimate to reinterpret Adorno’s injunction to silence. I hope that my music succeeds in doing so — just as Nora Gomringer has done with her three gently unsettling poems about the unthinkable.

The music to the TRIAS poems is not conceived as a traditional setting of the texts, but rather as a musical frame surrounding the images and associations expressed in words. At first, these draw our attention to seemingly minor or trivial incidents, only gradually — almost hesitantly — revealing the abyss of the Shoah as their true point of reference. Striving to avoid any kind of illustrative gesture, the music relates to the texts in an antagonistic yet complementary way, evoking the underlying conditions and atmosphere of what is described. In the interludes, however — and at certain characteristic moments — the music becomes autonomous, responding to the text in its own voice. This is especially true of the postlude, which, as an expressive lamento, offers an open-ended, resonant commentary.

In the first poem, sharp and piercing chord progressions represent “painful barbs” — symbols of hostility and aggression. In the second, aleatorically organized motion patterns form sound fields that generate tension and pressure. In the third, “hollow” noise textures and distorted triadic harmonies mirror the deception and hypocrisy of a society that always pretends it did everything right.

M.L.