Die Große Reihe – Mensch und Maschine by Various, to 24 maalis 2022, Alkaen (2022/2022), Musiikinjohto Ulrich Kern, Kultur- und Kongresszentrum - Liederhalle, Stuttgart, Germany

György Ligeti's (1923-2006) only opera “Le Grand Macabre” (premiered in 1978) is preceded by a very short “Overture” for twelve historical instruments, which can very rarely be heard in the symphony orchestra, but which can hardly be heard anywhere else. In the context of man - machine you get a well-deserved place of honor. The completion of Jacques Offenbach's (1819-1880) only opera prevented his death. Only his colleague Ernest Guiraud created a performable version of the fragment. The plot is based on stories from ETA Hoffmann, who, as already mentioned (see page ???), had a preference for the border area between the natural and the artificial. In Hoffmann's story "The Sandman", which is the model for the second act of the Offenbach Opera, a young man falls in love with a young lady whose artificiality the lover unfortunately cannot recognize because he is looking through the wrong glasses ... Ludwig van Beethovens (1770-1827) Eighth is repeatedly referred to the work of the inventor Johann Nepomuk Mälzel (see page ???). But even without this reference, because of her wit and her musical irony, she is in exactly the right place within the framework of this program! "The Mysteries of the Macabre are arrangements of three coloratura arias (by the head of the 'Secret Political Police' ') that Elgar Howarth (wonderful!) Arranged for a chamber ensemble," writes Ligeti. George Gershwin's tone poem “An American in Paris” (1928) describes the confusing impression that a not completely familiar culture makes on a stranger. Here, in musically painted Paris, we encounter the unusual instruments from the beginning of our program again.