A setting in German of a poem by Hans-Georg Bulla, commissioned by Deutscher Chorveband for performance by the Bavarian Radio Choir under Rupert Huber at the chor.chom festival in Dortmund, Germany on October 1st 2015
Programme notes
I discovered this poem in 2001 on my way back to my hotel after a slightly bibulous evening in Stuttgart. Having been told which tram to take, I duly got on it; unfortunately it was going in the wrong direction. Not knowing Stuttgart (and being in a mellow state of mind), I didn’t realise this until we reached the end of the line – at which point the tram-driver took a fifteen-minute coffee-break before starting back in the direction of my hotel. While I was waiting (all alone apart from the tram-driver, who refused to open the doors & let me out) I noticed above the seat opposite me a poster displaying this poem by Hans-Georg Bulla . I liked it, and started thinking about musicking it, but had neither pencil nor paper, so I learned it by heart – fortunately it’s quite short. When I reached my hotel room some hours later, I wrote it down before I forgot it, and kept it in one of my work-books until the right opportunity presented itself – which it did in 2015, when the Austrian conductor Rupert Huber suggested I write a short piece for Chor.com – an organisation in Berlin (also known as Deutscher Chorverband) which promotes amateur choral singing in Germany. It was first performed in Dortmund on 1st October 2015.
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to be added . . .