"Merci Satie"

Astrid loves Erik Satie's Gymnopédie No. 1. She has had images of it in her head ever since she first heard it during her student days: an autumnal, melancholy mood, empty parks in Paris with yellowish and reddish-brown leaves on the gravel paths, rain-soaked avenues... So Siggi started to take a closer look at the piece and came to the conclusion that it wasn't an easy project. The piece is incredibly famous and is even used in commercials. The great pianists, however, seem to avoid it because, although it is fascinating, the accompaniment, which is basically always the same, can quickly degenerate into an organ grinder. A new idea was needed. So we abandoned the original version for solo piano and Siggi rearranged the piece. And suddenly everything changed: the piano became a harp, the melody part was taken over by the flute and with this floating lightness, the mood also changed. It became spring-like and dreamy, nature was flooded with light and friendly, flowers and bright colors (especially white and yellow) wanted to join the sound of the flute. And so the spring greeting "Merci Satie" was born. We gave the video this name because our version is quite different from Satie's original.



Johanna Keupp-Kosbahn (flute), Siegfried Marx (arrangement, instruments), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Above The Mountains

This video takes up a German poem that is still popular in Japan today. In our country, however, both the poem and its author have been completely forgotten. Carl Busse (1872 - 1918) was a German writer, literary critic and co-editor of the "Deutsches Wochenblatt". His poem "Über den Bergen" must have been published around 1900, as there are several composers who set this poem to music at the time. In Japan, "Over the Mountains (山のあなた, Yama no Anata) became known through the anthology Kaichō on by Ueda Bin from 1905. It was republished in 2010, reviving interest in this poem.

Carl Busse:  Over The Mountains
Above the mountains, far to wander,

People say, happiness dwells,

Oh, and I went in the swarm of others,

Returned with eyes full of tears.

Over the mountains, far, far away,

People say that happiness lives…

Siggi composed melancholy music in a romantic style. Johanna sings the verse first in German, then in Japanese. The music and the images transport us to a fairytale world... Tak photographed the mystical mountain landscape on Cran Canaria and created the figures with the help of artificial intelligence.

Johanna Keupp-Kosbahn (vocals), Siegfried Marx (composition, piano), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)
Sources:
https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Hermann_Busse
https://www.gedichte7.de/ueber-den-bergen.html

file:///Users/astridklier-marx/Downloads/U%CC%88ber%20den%20Bergen-2.pdf

p. 115/116

R. Schumann: Von fremden Ländern und Menschen

(Of Foreign Countries and People)

In 1838, when this piano piece was written, "foreign lands" were probably understood to mean Italy or France. Nowadays, however, we tend to think of more exotic regions when we hear this title... We have therefore combined the music with photos from Tak's trip to Morocco in spring 2023. The "foreign people" are more difficult for us to depict for legal reasons. But here, too, we found a solution and there are always people in the pictures, albeit not as portraits. We have saved this for the final picture. It shows someone who officially authorized the photo, namely our photographer Tak in Bedouin garb...
Siggi has played this piano piece from Robert Schumann's cycle "Kinderszenen" at a slower pace, but not too slow, and the sequence of images is also somewhat quicker than usual this time.
In September 2023, an earthquake in Ait Benhaddou and Tizi-n-Tichka in the High Atlas destroyed a lot. Tak could no longer photograph some of the images as we see them in the video...

Siegfried Marx (piano), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

The Spring Has Come

Our photographer Takashi had the idea for this project. He introduced us to some wakas (Japanese poems) and we team members were immediately fascinated, because even through the (sometimes contradictory) translations, we felt the magic of this poetry... The special thing about these poems is that they were written over 800 years ago, but are still loved and read today, in modern Japan.

This is the second video of this project. After Waka No. 5 "Deep In The Mountains", we have now released Waka No. 33 in our own version. It is a spring poem by KINO TOMONORI:

Hisakatano - Spring has come, and once again

Hikarinodokeki - The sun shines in the sky

Harunohini - So gently smiles the heavens that 

Shizukokoronaku - It almost makes me cry,

Hananochiruramu - When blossoms droop and die.

In the video info for Waka No. 5 you can find more detailed information about the wakas:

About the music: Siggi has again oriented himself to the pentatonic system and deliberately made his composition simple. The clear sound of the koto creates the basis for the three female voices (all sung by Johanna), whose harmony creates an atmosphere in which, in view of the falling cherry blossoms, both beauty and the melancholy of the transient become perceptible.

Johanna Keupp-Kosbahn (vocals), Siegfried Marx (composition, instruments), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

The Flower`s Tint Is Washed Away - Waka 9

This is our third video on a Japanese poem after Waka No. 5 "Deep In The Mountains" and Waka No. 33 "Spring Has Come", now the Waka No. 9.

The text particularly appealed to the women in the team:

The flower's tint is washed away

By heavy showers of rain;

My charms, which once I prized so much,

Are also on the wane,

Both bloomed, alas! in vain.

ONO NO KOMACHI, the author, "was a famous female poet who lived from 834-880 AD. She is remembered for her talent, her beauty, her pride, her love of luxury, her frailty and her misery in old age. The magic of her art is said to have overcome a severe drought that afflicted the country in 866, when prayers to the gods proved useless."

About the photos: The flowers referred to in this spring poem are naturally associated with "cherry blossoms" in Japan. However, Tak had the idea that we could use photos of roses this time, which would appeal to European viewers. For us, the rose is the epitome of beauty. We in the team find this interpretation very successful - but we don't know whether Japanese viewers feel the same way...

About the music: The composition imitates the strict form of the poem (5-7-5-7-7 "syllables" per line) by alternating between 5/8th and 7/8th bars. The melancholy mood is captured by the interplay of piano, flute, alto flute (can also be replaced by violin) and Johanna's singing voice.

About the text: Translations from Japanese into English are very difficult with these poems. We have therefore used the English translation of this poem by William Porter but we had to change “The blossom`s tint” into “The flower`s tint” according to the photos we used. The following quotation gives a small insight into the difficulties of translation: "The first and last verses may mean either that "the hue of the flower fades under the world's lingering downpour", or that "the beauty of this flower (i.e. itself) fades as I grow older and older in this life"; while the third line, which separates the two verses, means that the hue of the flower and its own beauty are both vanity. This stanza, with its double meaning throughout, is an excellent example of the characteristic Japanese play on words."

The quotations are taken from the book: Ogura Hyakunin Isshu: Hundert Menschen, jeder ein Gedicht, p. 14

Our photographer Takashi had the idea for this project. He introduced us to some wakas (Japanese poems) and we team members were immediately fascinated, because we felt the magic of this poetry even through the (sometimes contradictory) translations... The special thing about these poems is that they were written over 800 years ago, but are still loved and read today, in modern Japan. (Medieval German poetry is not so lucky...).　

In poems like this, "special emphasis was placed on ... aesthetic form. Appropriate paper, ink, calligraphy ... were used." Perhaps our experiment in this sense is not so far-fetched: we are trying to give the traditional text a modern "aesthetic form" (as mentioned above) with the means of our time, the digital media....

 The informations follow the Wikipedia article as of November 2022.

Deep In The Mountains

Our photographer Takashi had the idea for this project. He introduced us to some wakas (Japanese poems) and we team members were immediately fascinated, because we felt the magic of this poetry even through the (sometimes contradictory) translations... The special thing about these poems is that they were written over 800 years ago, but are still loved and read today, in modern Japan. (Medieval German poetry is not so lucky...).　

For the video we have chosen Waka No. 5 by SARUMARU DAYU from the poetry collection Ogura Hyakunin Isshu. It is a melancholic autumn poem.

Since our video follows the text as closely as possible, here are the "verses" each with its message core:

Okuyamani - Deep in the mountains

Momijifumiwake - On the way covered with fallen leaves
Nakushikano - The call of the deer 
Koekikutokizo - Is heard

Akiwakanashiki - The autumn is sad.

The accepted English prose version reads: How lonely autumn is when a deer calls his wife plodding on the ground covered with maple leaves in the mountains.

The deer and the maple leaves, which are bright red in autumn, are considered symbols of autumn in Japan, which is understandable for us in Germany.

In poems like this, "special emphasis was placed on ... aesthetic form. Appropriate paper, ink, calligraphy ... were used." Perhaps our experiment in this sense is not so far-fetched: we are trying to give the traditional text a modern "aesthetic form" (as mentioned above) with the means of our time, the digital media....

If you want to know more, please read on...

About the music: Siggi kept the music very transparent, so that Johanna's voice creates a melancholic, internalized, partly somewhat mystical mood. The melodic sections are based on the pentatonic system, as it is also used in Asian music, but the polyphonic voice leading follows the occidental tradition and reminds of a madrigal. In the middle section, the typical Japanese timbre of a koto (stringed instrument) is added, reinforcing the basic mood of sadness.

About the lyrics: Our poem is from the anthology Ogura Hyakunin Isshu, translated as: One Hundred Poems by One Hundred Poets - an interesting concept: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyakunin_Isshu.

 It is known that the collection of poems was written in 1235, but very little is known of the author of our poem Sarumaru Dayu, but he probably lived no later than 800 AD, so his poem is once again much older.

The wakas (poems) in the anthology Ogura Hyakunin Isshu are all written in the tanka form. The tanka (Jap. 短歌, Engl. short poem) is a Japanese rhymeless poem form at least 1300 years old with 31 syllables (the technical term is moren), in the arrangement 5-7-5-7-7 moren per line. It is older than the haiku we know (5-7-5 syllables), which evolved from the tanka. A tanka evokes the moment, capturing it with precision and musicality.

In Japan, a tanka is often written in a single line; in other languages, it is often written in the form 5-7-5-7 moren per line. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tanka

The informations follow the two Wikipedia articles listed, as of November 2022.

Johanna Keupp-Kosbahn (vocals), Siegfried Marx (composition, instruments), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Aquarium

When Siggi learned that Johanna has an alto flute, it immediately triggered something in him and he composed this piece. The alto transverse flute in G is tuned a fourth lower than the normal transverse flute, i.e. it is larger and sounds richer and deeper. This is very nice, but the instrument is also more difficult to play. The composition is in 11/4 time, composed of a 6/4 measure (4+2) and a 5/4 measure (2+3). This sounds complicated and is unusual, but is hardly noticeable when listening. Siggi finds the number 11 interesting (it is, after all,  a prime number and also the carnival number)... When Johanna and Astrid heard the piece, both immediately had the impression: water. And so we came up with the idea of the underwater theme in a Skype meeting. It turned out that Tak was in Stralsund in 2019 and had taken the appropriate photos there - fortunately already then - in the Ozeaneum. But if you dedicate a museum to the "sea," you have to address environmental protection these days. The museum writes on its website in the "About Us" section that it has made it its mission to "contribute to the exploration and communication of these global and ecological interrelationships through museum means." It wants to work "towards the perception of the global and direct responsibility of each individual." Therefore, the environmental protection aspect also appears in our video, albeit in an aesthetic form, but nevertheless unmistakable...

Johanna Keupp-Kosbahn (flute), Siegfried Marx (composition, piano), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Friends

 Siggi composed a piece for Marlene and Helmut Bahr called "Friends". This seemed fitting to Astrid as a Christmas gift for the friends of our videos and in general. And so she made a video for it from the favorite photos of Johanna, Tak, Siggi and herself. Hopefully it will find its way to many people as a sign of friendship!

Siegfried Marx (composition, piano), Tak Kuratuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Encounter with Ebino (Japan)

Ebino is Tak's home. It is located in the very south of Japan. The landscape there is created by volcanoes and so there are many hot springs and excellent drinking water. The town, with a population of about 20,000, is located on a plain with many rice fields, surrounded by rolling hills and mountains. Ebino Plateau National Park was one of the first national parks in Japan and its beautiful landscape still attracts tourists from all over the world. Our Ebino is characterized by autumn light and forests that already foreshadow winter. The rice fields in the plain are harvested (the last picture shows a "rice field god"), but cosmos and spider lilies still shine in powerful colors.

Tak took a lot of beautiful photos in Ebino and Astrid tried to put as many of his favorite photos as possible in the video, matching the music, which the whole team also particularly likes.

Johanna Keupp-Kosbahn (flute), Siegfried Marx (composition, piano), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

For Katharina

After a two-year forced break from Corona, Siggi's mother visited us again in August 2021. She likes the piano (fortunately, because her two sons play the piano) and classical music. So Siggi wrote a piece for her that captures her eventful life in harmonious sounds. And since roses are her favorite flowers, Astrid chose photos for the video that Tak took in the rose garden in Eltville near Wiesbaden (... and also a rose from Siggi's and Astrid's garden is included).

Siegfried Marx (composition, piano), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

For Astrid

Siggi made this composition for his wife Astrid. He feels she is so balanced (symbolized by the tonal sounds and the red blossoms) that she can also absorb and harmonize (at the end of the video the unfamiliar sounds are integrated into "normal" chords, pink blossoms illustrate this synthesis) the unknown/unexpected or even unpleasant (symbolized by the unfamiliar, clashing sounds and the white blossoms at the beginning of the video).

Siegfried Marx (composition, piano), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Windows

Siggi composed this calm, meditative music just like that, without any idea of any pictures that should belong to it ... Finally it became the "windows" - a journey from the center via northern Germany to Ireland, Japan, Italy and back again the south of Germany. While researching this topic, we came across a lot of interesting information, including the cycle of poems "Les Fenêtres", which the famous German poet Rainer Maria Rilke wrote in French.

Siegfried Marx (composition, piano), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

For Johanna

Siggi composed this piece as a thank you for Johanna Keupp-Kosbahn because she introduced us to Tak Kuratsuwa and his wonderful photos. The flute part was written for her and also played by her. Astrid had the basic idea of the lotus flower for the video because the noble and beauty of this flower go well with Johanna. This resulted in a walk through the gardens of Kyoto, which ends at this beautiful place over the sea, which Astrid dreams of during her yoga exercises. Kyoto is not by the sea, but the video is not supposed to be a documentation either, but is intended as a relaxing mini vacation for Johanna (and of course for everyone else who needs it), for a short recharge in between ...

Johanna Keupp-Kosbahn (flute), Siegfried Marx (composition, piano), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Cherry Blossoms - Sakura

This video was Tak's wish, but the more cherry blossoms we saw, the more enthusiastic we became about “Sakura” and we could understand why the Japanese celebrate the cherry blossom season year after year. This video is based on photographs that Tak took in Germany and Japan. It starts and ends with Japanese blossoms, but in between there is a sequence with blossoms and cherry trees from Germany. The transitions shouldn't be noticeable. But if you look closely you can see when the first German cherry blossom appears. Siggi wrote the music based on the Japanese folk song "Sakura, Sakura" and also recorded it as "Koto". The koto is a typical Japanese string instrument, a kind of large zither.

Siegfried Marx (music), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video), traditional Japanese song

November Mist

For the autumn fog, Siggi has chosen sounds that are not based on major and minor and that musically express the blurring of shapes and colors. To underline the somewhat mystical atmosphere, this time the instrument is a harp. But the light is getting through more and more and at the end of the video the sun has almost made it and the colors are shining again.

Siegfried Marx (music), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Flower Meditation

The meditations were Siggi's first own compositions, to which he combined photos. But when we saw Tak's photos, it was clear that we had to re-illustrate the meditations with his photos. During the flower meditation, Astrid found that the music also goes well with the insects and butterflies.

Siegfried Marx (music), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Winter-Meditation

This very calm and thoughtful meditation inspired Astrid to take a virtual forest walk in the Corona winter 2021. Fortunately, Tak was also often in the forest and captured many beautiful motifs with his camera ...

Siegfried Marx (music), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Kyoto-Meditation

The Kyoto mediation is one of Astrid's favorite videos (next to the video “For Johanna”). Tak's breathtaking photos of the gardens in Kyoto, the intensity of the autumn colors, the wonderful atmosphere - she watches the video again and again and lets it sink in. This is her favorite little "time out" ...

Siegfried Marx (music), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Industries-Poems

Can industrial plants be beautiful? When we saw the photos of Tak Kuratsuwa, the answer was clear: yes, they can. Inspired by this, Siggi wrote this piece.

Siegfried Marx (music), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Sleepless Through The Night

Siggi wrote this music as "meditation", but since it seems quite nervous and restless, we called it "Sleepless through the night". It was the first video of the team of three Siggi / Astrid / Tak.

Siegfried Marx (music), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Rose-Meditation

That was the beginning ... The idea to combine music with pictures came to Siggi when he was composing his first meditation. He has the roses in front of his eyes in the garden - and he loves them and cares for them.

Siegfried Marx (composition, piano, photos, video)

Cherry Blossoms in Germany

This video is a tribute to the Japanese and their love for cherry blossoms! But since we live in Germany, we tried to find "Sakura" here. Germany also has many cherry trees and Germans love to walk in the cherry orchards - however, these are the white blossoming cultivated cherries whose fruits are harvested in the summer. There are also many wild cherry trees that decorate the landscape with their clouds of white blossoms in the spring. And there are the wonderful Japanese ornamental cherries with their pink blossoms. They are becoming more and more popular in Germany! Tak took all the photos in this video in Germany. Johanna sings the "new" verse of the well-known song in Japanese, accompanied by sounds that seem Japanese to German ears. Then the composition wanders through various Western musical forms. Johanna sings our German version of the lyrics at the end of the video instead of the "old" Japanese verse. (This verse is the original song text, but because the Japanese school children found it difficult to learn these verses, a new version was created. Johanna sings this version at the beginning of the video).

Traditional Japanese folksong - Johanna Keupp-Kosbahn (vocal, flute), Siegfried Marx (arrangement/piano), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

1st Lyrics (Japanese)
Sakura, sakura                                        Cherry blossoms, cherry blossoms, 

noyama mo sato mo                             In fields and villages, as far as you can see. 
miwatasu kagiri                                      Is it a mist, or clouds? 

kasumi ka kumo ka                               Clouds of blossoms shimmer softly 

asahi ni niou                                             Fragrant in the morning sun.

sakura sakura                                          Cherry blossoms, cherry blossoms,

hana zakari                                               Flowers in full bloom.

2nd Lyrics (German )

Sakura, Kirschblütenbaum                 Sakura, cherry blossom tree

Deiner Blüten rosa Traum                   Your blossoms pink dream   

Duftet übers Land so weit.                  smells over the land so far.

Blütenwolken schimmern sanft       Clouds of blossoms shimmer softly

In der Morgensonne Glanz                  in the morning sun's glow.

Sakura, komm mit mir,                        Sakura, come with me

Komm mit mir und schau...               come with me and see...

The Last Evening

At our first team meeting in July 2021, Tak suggested this project. He had noticed that the song "Kokyouwo Hanaruru uta" (Farewell to Home), which is extremely well-known in Japan, has the melody of the German folk song "Der letzte Abend". The Japanese version of the song can be found in many, many different videos on YouTube. But Tak searched in vain for a video with the German lyrics of "Der letzte Abend", apparently there was none yet. He did a lot of research on this topic and also wrote his own essay about it, see our "Thoughts" page.

In Germany the song is almost unknown. Or do any of you know it? We didn't know it and we didn't find any recordings of this song. That's why we made one of "Der letzte Abend" ourselves. And since Johanna is learning Japanese, we dared and also recorded a Japanese version of "Kokyouwo Hanaruru uta" (Farewell to Home).

But that was not the end of our work on this topic and a third video followed... See next video info: Abschied von der Heimat/Tränen hab' ich viele, viele vergossen.
Traditional German folksong - Johanna Keupp-Kosbahn (vocal, flute), Siegfried Marx (arrangement/piano), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Farewell to the homeland/Tears I have shed many, many

We thank our audience very much for the many clicks our Japanese version of "Kokyouwo Hanaruru uta" (Farewell to Home) has received! And we are especially happy that an exchange with some of our viewers/listeners has taken place via comments and mails. We learned that the inspiration for the Japanese "Kokyouwo Hanaruru uta" (Farewell to Home) was probably the poem "Abschied von der Heimat" (Farewell to Home) by the German poet August Heinrich Hoffmann von Fallersleben (1798-1874), which has also been passed down with the melody of "Der letzte Abend". (Sometimes simply the first verse is used as the title: "Tränen hab' ich viele, viele vergossen.") There are strikingly many parallels between the two poems. And so, although the Japanese "Kokyouwo Hanaruru uta" (Farewell to the Homeland) has adopted the melody of "Der letzte Abend," in terms of content it borrows from stanzas 2-4 of Fallersleben's "Abschied von der Heimat/Tränen hab' ich viele, viele vergossen."

Folk songs often exist in several variants, with slight textual or musical variations. We have chosen the version of the Volksliederarchiv (https://www.volksliederarchiv.de/traenen-hab-ich-viele-viele-vergossen/), because here a two-part version is handed down. And since the technique allows Johanna to sing both voices, we tried this once, and for a change we chose a stubnmusi arrangement with guitar, harp and double bass instead of a piano accompaniment. The second verse here differs somewhat from the version found on our "Thoughts" page (https://www.siegfriedmarxandfriends.de/gedanken#1196558248). In collections, the song appears under the headings "escape" and "emigration." Since Fallersleben lets a child speak in the first verse, the interpretation "emigrant song" seemed to us to be the less cruel one and so we let the accordion at the end of the video symbolically suggest a journey across the sea...

We thank Mr. Sakiyama, Mr. Ushijima and Mr. Hori very much for their references to the Fallersleben song! Mr. Hori wrote in his comment to the video "Der letzte Abend" that he would like us to record the song "Abschied von der Heimat/Tränen hab' ich viele, viele vergossen" as well.... Dear Mr. Hori, thank you for this suggestion and encouragement! Here is the video!

Traditional German folksong - Johanna Keupp-Kosbahn (vocal, flute), Siegfried Marx (arrangement/piano), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Butterfly

In the summer of 2022 Siggi was inspired to write a composition about a butterfly, whichfirst sitspeacefully on a blossom, nibbling nectar and enjoying the beautiful weather, butthen is surprised by a thunderstorm. In the end, however, the butterfly survives everythingwell... Johanna has accepted thechallenge and played this difficult piece quite wonderfullysensitive and floating, so that flute and piano form a real unity. Of course, she refused the offer to simplify some parts.

With the pictures, however, there were problems. Tak has a lot of beautiful photos of sitting butterflies, but the music also requires flying ones. So he experimented, even made films, also in slow motion, he was in the Frankfurt butterfly house and tried out a lot. But the most fitting were still his photos of Japanese butterflies. The solution for the video now therefore deviates somewhat from the composers basic idea, but in the end everyone has his own idea of what he hears...

Siegfried Marx (composition, piano), Johanna Keupp-Kosbahn (flute), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Tango de las Calas - Dance Of The Calla Lillies

Siggi loves the Argentine tango and so he once composed one of his musical tango ideas. The two melody voices - the dancing couple, so to speak - are played by Johanna on the flute and the alto flute. Something very special this time are the pictures:

The photos used in this video were taken in Walter Adler's photo studio. Two specimens of callas flowers were photographed with different lighting and different color filters. Walter Adler is a professional photographer and the chairman of a photo club GDF-Hessen in Eppstein, to which our Tak Kuratsuwa also belongs. He holds photo workshops on a regular basis.

If you are interested in photography, please contact him;

Name: Society Digital Photography (GDF) e.V.

Address: Lindenkopfstraße 13

   65817 Eppstein Germany

Phone: 0171 1425442

Website: https://gdf-hessen.de/

Siegfried Marx (music)  　

Johanna Keupp-Kosbahn (flutes)

Walter Adler, Tak Kuratsuwa (photos)

Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Andrea Kuhn, Jeanine Waisala (title)

Baroque Fantasie

Siggi wanted to write another fantasy for solo flute... It became a homage to Johann Sebastian Bach, whose famous Partita in A minor (BWV 1013) inspired him. Siggi kept the strict form of the Partita and composed passages that sound "genuinely" baroque, but often he uses (quite unbaroque) modern or modal sound combinations. After all, we live in the 21st century. The repetition of the first section was used in the Baroque period to show the performer`s virtuosic skills through ornamentation (we would say "improvisations" today). Siggi, however, wrote down these variations, as these improvisations are unusual in classical music today.

Astrid chose Tak's photos of baroque still lifes. There is a separate story about this (see the page "Thoughts are free"). However, since the music is not purely "baroque", photos of Tak's modern still lifes also appear with the images. It's exciting to discover the similarities or differences between the paintings of the old masters and their modern counterparts! Johanna immediately accepted the challenge of this piece and she has taken great pleasure working on it on it.

Siegfried Marx (music), Johanna Keupp Kosbahn (flute), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos, modern still lifes), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Hanabi Fantasy

For this piece Siggi had a rather crazy starting idea: He chose a scale as the basis of his composition, in which a whole tone is followed by a semitone (i.e. c - d - e-flat - f - f-sharp - g-sharp - a - h - c). This sounds somewhat floating and surprising. Hence the title: a "fantasy" is a musical form that does not impose any specifications. So the composer can unfold and try out quite freely.

The photos for this are also surprising... Tak photographed these beautiful fireworks impressions at the event "Mainzer Sommerlichter" 2018. "Hanabi" is the Japanese word for "fireworks"... That's why we named the piece "Hanabi Fantasy".

Johanna Keupp-Kosbahn (flute), Siegfried Marx (composition), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Fantasy For Flute

This video is something completely different, almost "extravagant" ...

This time Siggi composed a solo for Johanna. He used small melodic motifs (implemented in the picture as Romanesque / Gothic architectural elements), which then play around quite freely and are continued without any connection to major or minor or a certain key. This will sound quite strange to some ears. Tak's beautiful photos of the train station in Kyoto and a few others of Yokohama go well with this.

This time it took a long time to find the music and photos, because Siggi wrote the piece primarily for Johanna and her flute, purely for sound motifs. It was hard to put it into pictures. We experimented with black and white photos, but neither Tak nor Astrid are fans of it, it seemed too "cold", too unwelcoming. And at some point we had the solution that we have now published.

Astrid listened to the music countless times and tried out photos, cropped them, extended transitions and shortened them again - but the more she listened to the piece and looked at the photos, the more she liked everything.

Johanna Keupp-Kosbahn (flute), Siegfried Marx (composition, piano), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

The Experimental Waltz

Does a waltz always have to be in three-four time? As part of his “Dances” series, Siggi tried something completely different, a waltz in five-time (3 2). Although that might not be noticeable at first ... We have selected some from Tak's photos that are a bit more unusual. The video is also called “La Valse Expérimentale” because it is an experiment. Of course one can argue now whether this is a real waltz or what makes the waltz a waltz ...

Siegfried Marx (music), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Easter Still Life

Tak experimented with still lifes around Easter 2021. We found them incredibly beautiful and fascinating and Siggi was inspired by them to create music that has echoes of the music of the Renaissance. We sent the video to our friends as a musical Easter greeting.

Siegfried Marx (music), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Walpurgis BACH

Siggi had Tak's photos in mind when he composed this piece. In this respect, Astrid had it easy this time, because it was clear which photos should be selected for the music. You don't actually notice how sophisticated the composition is in terms of music: It is based on two themes, one is the famous sequence of notes BACH and the other is its cancer form HCAB. But because the whole thing sounds so mystical and a bit scary, we named the piece "Walpurgis BACH" after the Walpurgis Night on May 1st, when the witches dance on the Blocksberg according to legend ...

Siegfried Marx (composition / music), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Dark Venice

A difficult story of how it came about: Tak has a lot of incredibly beautiful Venice photos. Astrid therefore wanted to make a Venice video and imagined sparkling, radiant music - or maybe two movements, one bright and festive, one foggy-melancholy or, best of all, three movements (happy / relaxed - foggy / melancholy - festive / radiant). But since Siggi has never been to Venice and he doesn't like water too much, the result is a music that represents the other side of the city, the decay, the constant humidity - the “dark” Venice. Tak thought that was good and Astrid is ultimately also satisfied with the video.

Marx (music), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

A year later we recorded the music again, this time Johanna played the flute parts. Since the music was now even more beautiful, we also reworked the video again and improved the photo selection and composition. The new video is now called "Dark Venice". For comparison we leave both versions on the net for now: new "Dark Venice" and old "The dark Venice".

Siegfried Marx (composition, music), Johanna Keupp-Kosbahn (flute), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Barbara's Faschings-Zwiefacher

Siggi wanted to do something funny during the carnival season. The Zwiefache is a Bavarian folk dance and consists of combinations of two and three bars, which should be as unpredictable as possible. Allegedly so that the dancers from another village (who did not know the local Zwiefacher) embarrassed themselves on the dance floor ... Siggi dedicated the piece to our dear colleague Barbara Schlaffer.

Siegfried Marx (music, pictures, video)

Tango

The tango, Siggi's favorite dance, inspired him to try something new in this style. To do this, he drew pictures with colored pencils that wanted to capture the steps and movements in the tango ... But the drawings were too weak in color, so he tried to transfer the templates to the computer with Gimp.

Siegfried Marx (composition, piano, pictures, video)

W. A. Mozart: Sonata No. 1 in B flat major, Allegro, KV 10

In her search for interesting sheet music, Johanna came across six rather unknown sonatas by the great Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The special thing about them: he wrote them as a child, at the tender age of 8! And even if not everything is composed according to the usual rules of the art at that time, these sonatas are bursting with musical ideas. The first movement of the first sonata is lively, witty and a bit teasing - an Allegro, in fact - and we immediately had the impression that the photos of birds could match it.

Therefore, for once, we were unfaithful to our photographer Tak, who hardly ever took photos of birds. Fortunately, chance had brought us an encounter we would never have expected: In May, during a trip to the Giechburg near Bamberg, Astrid and Siggi went to see an exhibition of the "Malschule Art Bamberg" (https://www.malschule-art.de/). The paintings were all very successful, often really beautiful and sometimes very touching. Astrid liked the giraffe picture of the seven years young Emma best and we bought the picture. This way we got to know a very kind Kurdish family and it turned out that not only the daughter is artistically talented, but also her dad. He photographs with passion the bird world of Bamberg. And so it happens that the young Mozart's Allegro and the birds of Bamberg have come together in our video.

Siegfried Marx (music), Johanna Keupp Kosbahn (flute),  Hishyar Hassun (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video)

Albeniz: Tango in D

Astrid and Siggi love to dance tango, so Siggi imagined the tempo they would dance to for this tango... His interpretation of this famous piece by Isaac Albeniz is therefore a bit more restrained and slower than many other recordings. Tak took the photos in the Canary Islands in May 2022. However, Astrid chose only photos from Lanzarote for the video. She dedicates this video to her dear friend and colleague Steffi Ettinger, who loves to vacation there and always brings her wonderful soaps from there.

Siegfried Marx (piano), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos),  Astrid Klier-Marx (video)　

F.X. Mozart: Rondo e Minor

Many music lovers do not know that the great Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart had a son who also became a composer: Franz Xaver Mozart (1791-1844). His work is quite forgotten today, but in recent years his "Rondo in E minor" has become better known again. And we also want to contribute to this with our recording. Johanna had the idea for it and so we set to work. The work was probably composed in the 1820s. It still contains musical elements of the 18th century such as the clear melody of the flute or the almost baroque middle section. The piano, on the other hand, is already allowed to indulge in romanticism. The musicians were able to agree on their interpretation quite quickly, but the illustration took longer and required a lot of experimentation.

The present concept assigns certain pictorial motifs to each of the clearest musical themes (e.g., for the 1st theme: fountains, for the "lovely" theme: putti, "baroque" part: Inlays). Many photos, on the other hand, only underline the mood of the music: e.g. lovely water games and tamed nature in parks or wild waterfalls in the wild... The photos were taken, among others, in Linderhof Palace, Herrenchiemsee Palace, in Schwetzingen Palace Park, in Munich, Starnberg, Kaiserslautern, Trier, in the wonderful library of the Wiblingen Monastery and in the Wieskirche. The waterfalls "Maruono Taki" are located on the Ebino Plateau in Japan.

Franz Xaver Mozart was aware throughout his life that he was in the shadow of his father, he "always appeared as W.A. Mozart son". He spent a large part of his life in Galicia, which is located in the present-day territory of Poland and Ukraine, but at that time belonged to the Habsburg Empire. He also spent a long time in Lviv in western Ukraine, which has been in the headlines in recent weeks for taking in thousands of refugees from the Ukraine war.

In 1810, F.X. Mozart to a friend: "The flute is such a gentle instrument, which suits quite well, to my, quite rapturous temperament". He found the piece "quite well done", it was "so gentle so singing".

If you listen more closely and want to understand the structure of the rondo form, you will be surprised, because the "Rondo in E minor" is not a rondo at all, but the first movement of a sonata and accordingly follows the sonata main movement form. The other movements of the sonata, however, were not composed by F.X. Mozart. The name "Rondo" was therefore not given by the composer himself, but by his executor Aloys Fuchs.

Information and quotations are taken from the preface of the Henle edition "F.X. Mozart Rondo in E minor" by Karsten Nottelmann.

For further information see: https://www.kammermusikfuehrer.de/werke/3941

Schumann - Träumerei

This video was made for celebrating the birthday of Siggi`s mother. Siggi chose not to play the piece in a typical romantic style but as interpreted through the eyes of a child who is completely absorbed in his own world. After all, the "Träumerei" also belongs to the cycle "Kinderszenen". The photos used are only in shades of pink - the “most peaceful color in the world” (Jean-Gabriel Causse). Perhaps this video will take you briefly through a serene world...

Orpheus with his lute

This song is also one of the Shakespeare songs by Betty Roe. The singer from the ancient saga, who tames wild nature with his singing, makes dangerous animals very trusting and soothes every kind of grief and pain, should be known to most. We have therefore decided not to display the text in the video so as not to impair the images. If you want to know exactly, you can read the original text and the German or Japanese translation under "SEE MORE" on YouTube. In this song Orpheus brings icy trees and mountain peaks to bend down to him, he soothes the wild sea and the worries and needs of the people dissolve. The mood is cheerful as springtime.

Johanna Keupp-Kosbahn (vocals, flute), Siegfried Marx (music), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video), Betty Roe (composition)

(Published with the kind permission of the composer)

Not yet public for copyright reasons.

Sigh no more

Johanna felt like these short songs based on texts by Shakespeare, so we tried something with singing. "Sigh no more" is a poem from the comedy "Much Ado About Nothing", which the English composer Betty Roe set to music. Johanna recorded the singing and flute parts in Munich and Siggi put everything together in Nuremberg. Astrid, as the woman of the word, wanted to accommodate the text somehow, so we faded in the central verses from the poem in one version and left the video pure in another. What is better?

Johanna Keupp-Kosbahn (vocals, flute), Siegfried Marx (music), Tak Kuratsuwa (photos), Astrid Klier-Marx (video), Betty Roe (composition)

(Published with the kind permission of the composer)

Not yet public for copyright reasons.

Domenico Scarlatti - Sonata in C

Domenico Scarlatti was a baroque harpsichord virtuoso who liked to incorporate special technical difficulties into his compositions. The trick in this sonata is that the pianist has to cope with large intervals of notes in which the fingers are not spread enough and the fingers have to make large "jumps". The hit rate is therefore rarely 100% ... But luckily it worked with Siggi's recording!

He created the pictures again with Gimp on the computer. Astrid thinks they fit very well, but of course the tastes are different ...

Siegfried Marx (harpsichord, pictures)

Mozart - Fantasy in cm, KV 475

Siggi is a big Mozart fan. The Fantasy in C minor is really beautiful and partly unusual because it contains sounds that sound like Beethoven's. Siggi tried to paint pictures on the computer that illustrate this special way ... Which for many viewers (even for Astrid) might be a little difficult to understand.

Siegfried Marx (piano, pictures)

Beethoven - Moonlight Sonata (and friends)

Siggi started playing the piano again after his retirement. The moonlight sonata was the first piece that he "warmed up". To do this, he combined his own photos. But photographing the moon is not that easy ... Our friends also noticed this when we showed them the video. Ursula immediately sent me one of her photos of the moon. We asked our friends for more photos of the moon and got several sent. We made the second version of the video out of these. The music stayed the same.

Siegfried Marx (piano, video) with photos of the moon by Marlene Bahr, Ursula Bahr, Ruth Drangmeister, Steffi Ettinger, Markus Hierhager, Dorothea Luther and Eva Wendt