Kurtág: Kafka-Fragmente

Music and poetry meet at Nasjonalbibilioteket when Linnéa Sundfær Casserly and Emil Huckle-Kleve perform Kurtág’s song cycle Kafka-Fragmente for solo soprano and violin. Inspired by Schubert’s Winterreise, Kurtág composed a 60-minute work consisting of 40 songs based on fragments of poems, letters and diary notes by Franz Kafka. Kafka’s texts are short and shift between the sensitive, the dreamy, the violent, the absurd and the humorous. And just like the text, Kurtág does the same in the music: with a range of a full three octaves in the vocal line, the whole register of the voice is used. The violin is used as both violin and ukulele, and is retuned in the middle of a piece. Sometimes the singer and the violinist meet in beautiful harmony, while at other times it sounds more like a musical brawl. This music is rarely performed in Norway, so this evening’s concert is a unique chance to hear it in beautiful surroundings.

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