Duration: 25 minutes

Danse Visions

I. Satisfaction. Tango-variations (1985)

»Dédicacé à la mémoire d’Alberto Ginastera et au créateur du ›tango nuevo‹ Astor Piazzolla.«

For violin and piano
Premiere: 1986, New York, Carnegie Recital Hall, played by René Staar
Duradion: ca. 9 minutes
Score: ECA Nr. 72002/01 Score (Extract, Pdf)

Audio sample:

René Staar, violin

Harald Ossberger, piano

II. Audace. Incitations de Rock (2025)

»À la mémoire de Jimi Hendrix«

for violin and piano
Duration: 7'50''

III. Fusion. TRAOGCK Amalgame (2026)

»À l'avenir de rythme musical«

About the work:

It took nearly 41 years from the inception of the idea for this 3rd Divertissement Suisse, Op. 10, “Danse Visions,” to its completion in February 2026. The first of the dance visions was composed in just a few weeks in the spring of 1985; work on the rest of the composition then had to be postponed time and again due to new, more pressing projects.

In 2025, the second Danse Vision was finally completed by mid-May; the composition of the third began in August 2025 and was completed on February 7, 2026.
The central idea of this final piece is the transition from a four-note chord to a five-note chord, which is the most important element in turning the six Divertissements into a complete cycle.

As to the details about the three Danse Visions:

Danse Vision I, entitled “Satisfaction. Tango Variations,” was composed in 1985 and is dedicated to the memory of two Argentine composers: Alberto Ginastera and his master student Astor Piazzolla. I developed a friendship based on open-mindedness and inquisitiveness with Ginastera and his wife, Aurora Natóla.

At that time, I was fascinated by the typical characteristics of the milonga and the tango; I compiled a catalog of variations on the tango rhythm that went beyond the traditional 4/8 meter and included a further development into 5/8 as well as freely changing meters. When this preliminary work was sufficiently advanced to consider its realization, ORF approached me with an offer to record new works (including my own), which greatly accelerated the creation of the first Danse Vision. The piece was written, rehearsed, and recorded within approximately four weeks. An underlying rhythm of 3+3+2 sixteenth notes constitutes the piece’s primary element, and also recurs at the end; it is interspersed with developmental as well as contrasting (quieter) sections.

Work on Danse Vision II also commenced in the summer of 1985. The piece was conceived as a critical commentary on American rock music, which was – and still is – generally repetitive, enervating, and shallow. Over the years, however, I have come to appreciate Jimi Hendrix’s rock music for its own merits. Progress on the composition was hindered by two factors: in addition to temporal, geographical, and professional changes, I repeatedly reoriented my artistic intentions due to new experiences, more accurate information, and new knowledge – resulting in the multiple approaches in composing this piece.

The model for the four parts of Danse Vision II comprises not only rock rhythms, but also the melodic and harmonic style of some of Hendrix's most important songs, with the transformation process turning the piece into a “hybrid butterfly”: harmonically, above all, this occurs through a fusion of chromaticism, pentatonicism, and the four-part harmony I constructed as a further development of the three-part harmony appearing in the first Danse Vision.

In Danse Vision III, TRAOGCK represents the fusion of the two terms tango and rock – their merging into an amalgam consisting not merely of the letters, but also of the rhythms and harmonies of the two preceding Danse Visions. Their origins in impoverished and socially marginalised sections of the population, as well as their tendency to emphasise weak beats, make these two musical genres closely related.

Right from the beginning, various possibilities of these accents collide between the violin and piano with great speed and energy. Two interwoven basic patterns manifest themselves in ever-changing forms. The constant alternation between four-part and five-part harmony also contributes to the piece’s pulsating energy, ultimately propelling it ever more urgently forward in a heated stretta – until it finally fades away in a Morendo-diminuendo...

The impetus for resuming the project was the successful completion of the small 4th Divertissement Suisse, Op. 10/4, which was also begun in 1985 and finished in 2022, as well as the composition of the 6th Divertissement Suisse, Op. 10/6, written between July 2022 and December 2023, and intended as the culmination of the entire cycle.

In fact all of the Divertissements Suisse (see Op. 10) can also be regarded as classical light music due to their dance-like structure; yet nowhere is the experimental aspect more evident than in these Dance Visions. Experimentation and tradition are in perfect balance here, which is why the work is also listed under the “Pop Revolution” category.