Born in Vienna in 1935, Kurt Schwertsik studied composition with Joseph Marx and Karl Schiske at the Vienna Academy of Music and in Cologne with Karlheinz Stockhausen. It wasn’t the influence of Stockhausen and the serialist movement that captured his imagination though, it was the discovery of John Cage and other American composing contemporaries who inspired his using of tonality as a means of communication. His compositions are characterised by his own particular exploration of tonality and easily accessible melodies, rhythms and harmonies, alongside lashings of musical irony and humour. Schwertsik has earned a reputation as one of Austria’s leading composers, representing the Third Viennese School of composers (Schubert himself being part of the First) and cutting an effervescent and influential figure in Viennese musical life.
Schwertsik’s Epilog zu Rosamunde, although always intended as a standalone concert piece, was very much written with the purpose of being performed at the end of Schubert’s complete incidental music to Rosamunde. Written in 1978, and premiered in the same year, this initially sombre work takes on a more theme and variation form than the through composed conclusive epilogues often heard, and crosses the sound worlds of John Adams and traditional late romanticism. Long string melodies merge with more fluid pulses, and the old and new surge in dramatic build ups to create beauty and subtle nods to Schubert’s original score.
Programme note © Amy Campbell