Harald Banter
(b.1930)
Orchestral Music
Harald
Banter was born Gerd von Wysocki on 16th March 1930 in Berlin, the son oE the
artistic director oE the Lindstrom-Odeon Record Company. He had his own
training in recording with Berlin Radio and was a composition pupil of Johannes
Pranschke and Georg Haentzschel. In
1950 he became a programme producer with North West German Radio in Cologne and
two years later Eounded the Harald Banter Ensemble, later the Media-Band,
working principally Eor West German Radio. In
1955 he took part in the UNESCO International Music Conference at Gravesano
with Hermann Scherchen and the following year gave his first jazz concert at
the Cologne Gürzenich with Albert Mangelsdorff and made a joint appearance with
the Modem Jazz Quartet in the Light Music Week in Stuttgart,
performing Gunther Schuller's Twelve by Eleven. He went on to take composition lessons with Bernd
Alois Zimmermann and in 1957 collaborated with Hans Werner Henze in the
Visconti ballet Maratona, first performed in Cologne under Hans Rosbaud.
In the following years came performances of Banter's Kantate 58 in
Cologne and the ballet Diana sorpresa at the Munich Gärtnerplatz
Theatre.
In
the 19605 Harald Banter directed a jazz class at the Duisburg Conservatory and
took part in master-courses for composition at Schloss Brühl for the Cologne Musikhochschule
under the direction of Henze. There
followed further work for broadcasting with Media-Band, teaching and seminars
and, in 1979, activity in the editing, production and direction of music for
West German Radio, with productions of work by Kurt Weill and the rediscovery
of operettas by Suppe, Strauss, Millöcker and Offenbach, as weIl as of dramatic
musical work by contemporary composers. The same year brought the first performance
of his Concerto tor soprano saxophone and jazz orchestra, followed in
1981 by the first performance of his Amores, based on Ovid, for tenor,
speaker, chorus and jazz orchestra.
In
the 19805 Banter's career continued with increasing distinction, performances
and recordings with his newly founded ensemble Vier plus Sechs (Four plus Six),
appointment as Vice-President of the German Composers' Union, the award in 1990
of the Silver Leaf of the Dramatic Union and of the Silver Medal of the German
Composers' Union for his services to German music. In 1994 he was awarded the title Honorary
Professor by the Ministry of Science and Research of North Rhine-Westphalia.
Harald
Banter, whose 65th birthday is celebrated in the present release, is a musician
of great versatility. He had early inspiration in jazz from hearing George
Shearing and was influenced by his contact with Zimmermann and collaboration
with Henze. He experimented with smaller jazz ensembles, rather than big bands,
collaborating with other contemporary composers and has played an important
part in the activities of the German copyright agency, the Gemeinschaft für Aufführungs-und
Mechanische Vervielfaltigungsrechte, GEMA. The value of his long career in
broadcasting has been widely acknowledged, with 45 years of service to West
German Radio as producer and editor.
Keith Anderson
The Rhapsodic Intermezzo tor piano and orchestra (Rhapsodisches
Intermezzo) was written in 1948, when the composer was eighteen, and is his
first concert piece. The pianist Heinz Butz, who gave the first performance of
the work with the Berlin Radio Orchestra under the direction of Otto Dobrindt
in 1949, was responsible for the arrangement. At this period Banter was under
the influence of Grieg and Rachmaninov and of his teacher Georg Haentzschel. The present programme starts and ends with a Rhapsody,
framing a career and development of same fifty years.
The Concert
Suite: Märchenbilder (Fairy-Tale Pictures) was written in 1961 in a
romantic-impressionist style and is essentially well-crafted entertainment
music. The suite includes four
movements, Der Geist in der Flasche (The Spirit in the Bottle), Die
Wunschinsel (The Island of Wishes), Der Zauberberg (The Magic
Mountain) and Der Traumkönig (The Dream King).
Prolog
2000 was written in 1972 on the
occasion of a presentation by Professor Karl Steinbuch, Man and Technology
in the Year 2000. In the
composition the relations between man and technology today were expressed, with
the understanding that for mankind technology is both progress and regress and
can mean even annihilation. When the piece was written it was not yet clear in
how short a time this might become true. After
a chorale-like introduction by the brass comes a twelve-note series, developed
next by the woodwind and altered by the cellos and double basses. A syncopated ostinato underlies the tone-row. This part is replaced by a rhythrnic quaver movement
in the strings, above which the sounds of the brass in intervals of a second,
stereophonical1y from left and right and diagonally across the whole orchestra,
are heard. After a crescendo
leading to a furioso fol1ows an electronic tape, symbolizing the technological
element of our time, jet-units, turbines and computer. Through aleatoric instrumental interventions the
musicians and the electronic sounds are brought together, growing denser in
texture and increasing in dynamics to a climax. The tone-row appears again providing a final
pianissimo catharsis.
Tod
des Aktaeon (The Death of Actaeon) is
from the bal1et Diana sorpresa (Diana Surprised), first staged at the
Munich Gärtner-Platz Theatre in 1960. The episode has been arranged by the composer as aseparate
concert-piece. Actaeon, son of the King of Thebes, saw Diana, goddess of the
chase, bathing and was changed by the goddess into a stag, to be killed by her
arrow.
The
rhapsody for cello and orchestra, Phädra, was inspired by the cellist
Maria Kliegel, who was of great assistance in the technical and musical aspects
of the work. The form is in
general classical. After a tutti introduction in which the whole musical
material is presented in pyramid chords, the work begins with a rhythmic
passage based on two motifs. This is
linked to an elegy in ballade style which leads to a dynamic climax and is sirnilarly
woven together from two thematic elements. There follows a short scherzo-like
transition to the last furioso section which provides an opportunity for
soloistic virtuosity and a final cadenza. The compositional techniques of the
work involve the classical principles of part-writing and harmony as well as a
twelve-note series and free tonal methods of construction, with jazz-inspired
configurations and scales. The
work is based on the legend of Phaedra, daughter of Minos, King of Crete,
sister of Ariadne and wife of Theseus. She
felt in love with her stepson Hippolytus, who repelled her advances. Fearing discovery she told her husband that
Hippolytus had pursued her and Theseus, believing her, prayed Poseidon, the god
of the sea, to destroy him. As Hippolytus
was driving in his chariot along the coast, suddenly a bull emerged out of the
sea. The horses shied and bolted,
dragging hirn to his death. Phaedra killed herself.
Harald
Banter (English version by Keith Anderson)