Giovanni Himmelfahrt Remix (Giovanni Ascension Remix) (2024)
(for orchestra)

Giovanni Himmelfahrt Remix was commissioned by the Nationaltheater Mannheim in commemoration of the 300th anniversary of the birth of Carl Theodor, a nobleman important in the region surrounding Mannheim, and also Schwetzingen, where I live with my family. My son attends the Carl Theodor School. My personal affinity for European nobility is scant, but one of Karl Theodore's characteristics was his love and support for the arts, which attracted people such as the writer Voltaire and also Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to his Schwetzingen summer residence. During the dress rehearsal to a performance of Mozart's "Don Giovanni" in the Rococo Theatre at the Schwetzingen palace I was asked about writing a short orchestra piece for this occasion. Thus I decided to think about responding to Mozart, in particular his Don Giovanni (but also including other of Mozart's pieces) as source material for this work. The idea of responding to historical music is something I have done before in my "Paganini Remix" and "Goldberg Hallucination Remix" pieces, so I thought this work might be an appropriate continuation of this approach. The musical language is my own, but one can hear subcutaneous fragments from Mozart's operas, from a recitative and aria of Donna Elvira, the harmonies from the "Drei Knaben" in the Magic Flute, from the last scene in The Marriage of Figaro and of course from the penultimate scene in Don Giovanni. There are also many other references woven into the score, often reharmonized or otherwise disguised. The image of a ghostly masquerade ball was in the back of my mind while writing this piece.