AT FEVER PITCH: THE MUSIC OF JÖRG WIDMANN

Extract

Just as a young grand master chooses, with a degree of self-acknowledgement, an opening that creates space for key playing strengths at a later stage, Jörg Widmann seems with every new work to alight on an initial strategy (usually in the form of just a single sound or a complex but discrete sonic entity) which not only occasions further related ideas in the composer's imagination but also reveals feasible compositional paths through the new material. In performance, this simultaneity of creation – in which the primary gesture is clearly a microcosm of the piece itself – may be perceived too in real time by the audience. Any closer analogy with the game of chess breaks down at this point: Widmann's openings remain ambiguous, marked by both a tentative approach and moved by a desire for more telling blows to render a score complete. Music – or the calling to write it, at least – remains nonetheless a considerable opponent. And the sense of the composer finding his bearings at the outset (one might say the onset) of a piece is palpable. A febrile tension is created.