Rihm: Verwandlung 1–4 – review

The four orchestral pieces that Wolfgang Rihm has so far called Verwandlung all date from the last decade, and stylistically inhabit a world that owes more to Mahler than any other composer. They are allusive, freely associating pieces, the first, second and fourth each just over 15 minutes long, the third nearer 10, and each sets out on its musical journey from a different starting point – a single pitch, a guileless Ländler, a luminous texture, a series of emphatic attacks. The music seems to define its own form as it unfolds, with its long, sinuous instrumental lines, making passing references to a number of composers from Wagner to Sibelius, via Schreker, Strauss and Korngold, as well as toying almost nostalgically with conventional tonality. Verwandlung 2 ends unambiguously on an E flat major chord, while the fourth threatens to settle into D minor as comfortably as a Bruckner symphony. In Rihm's music it seems that everything – the whole of music history – is up for grabs, for reappraisal and for recycling.