Bernd Johannes Wolf
musician / composer
If music be the food of love, play on.
(William Shakespeare)
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upcoming concerts:
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Bach, Christmas Oratorio I-III - Island of Hiddensee , Inselkirche, December 31st 2024 and January 1st 2025 / https://www.kirche-hiddensee.de/event-location/inselkirche-kloster/
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Suddenly Hip(p). The Life of Jutta Hipp Between Jazz and Art - reading with music by the trio: Ilona Haberkamp / alto sax, Jona Kümper / piano, Bernd Wolf / double bass, "Romanfabrik" Frankfurt, February 7th 2025 / https://www.romanfabrik.de/programm/
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Kreissinfonieorchester EN - "Nordlicht", (Northern Light) Music from Scandinavia , March 15th 2025, 6pm, Witten-Herbede / March 16th 2025, 11am Gevelsberg, Kulturzentrum Alte Johanneskirche / Saturday 22nd 2025, 6pm, Gesamtschule Hattingen-Welper / www.kso-en.de
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Rhine-Ruhr Philharmonic - Antonin Dvorak, 7.th Symphony a.o. , March 29th 2025, 7pm/ Hattingen, Gebläsehalle / April 6th / 4.30 pm, Bochum, Anneliese Brost Musikforum / www.rheinruhrphilharmonie.de
Here is the video cut of the premiere of my chamber opera "Des Bösen gelbe Schwefellichter" - "The yellow sulphur lights of evil" commemorating the pogrom night on November 9th, 1938, in Hattingen on November 12th 2023, with wonderful vocal and instrumental soloists, a powerful experience for everyone present. The work has subsequently been awarded with the Homeland Prize for Hattingen 2023.
The 17th of October 2021 marked the 65th anniversary of the chess “game of the century” between Donald Byrne and Bobby Fischer, spectacularly won by then 13-year-old Bobby Fischer. On this day, in Hattingen-Blankenstein, there was the premiere of my concept piece «Une partie d’échecs» for string quartet, which translates the game into music. My composition was part of a programme with music (Philidor, Rossini, Mendelssohn-Bartholdy) related to the royal game.
Live recording of the premiere on October 17, 2021, in Hattingen-Blankenstein (animation: Jonas Wolf)
In the strange year of 2020, among other things two "Corona" works sprang from my quill, both songs, albeit both of a completely different nature.
The first one was created during the first phase of the first lockdown, soon after the poet Friedrich Hölderlin's birthday - as with Beethoven this year it was his 250th.
It so happened that the Lied duo Inga Balzer (soprano) and Tilman Wolf (piano) launched an online concert series from their home, and thankfully included my setting of Hölderlin's "Come! into the open, friend!" in their programme for the fourth edition of their series, even choosing its title as the programmatic heading for the whole concert.
So here is their performance of my composition as it could be heard and seen in the online concert:
The second is a setting of the poem "This Is Just To Say" by the American poet William Carlos Williams (1883-1963) for soprano and cello.
Here again I am delighted that Chicago-based soprano Josefien Stoppelenburg and cellist Jean Hatmaker have taken a liking to my piece, enough for it to be included in their wonderful project, namely a CD with compositions solely for soprano and cello by composers from around the globe, which was released in October 2021 by Navona Records under the title of Modern Muses and awarded with a Bronze Medal at the Global Music Awards 2022. https://www.navonarecords.com/catalog/nv6377/
"This Is Just To Say"
Et voilà: