DUO OXYMORON

Anna Stein­kog­ler &
Valen­tin Butt

Old and new. Light and dark. Cham­ber music and groo­ve. Harp and accor­di­on. In their debut album “Scen­ted Rus­hes”, the Ber­lin-based ensem­ble DUO OXYMORON crea­tes an uncon­ven­tio­nal, colourful sound lan­guage, com­bi­ning jazz, neo­clas­si­cal and con­tem­po­ra­ry play­ing techniques. 

Their love for free­dom, their desi­re for expe­ri­ments and the mix of styl­es both musi­ci­ans can revert to results in an inde­pen­dent sound uni­ver­se. DUO OXYMORON tre­ats any kind of music like cham­ber music in the truest sen­se of the con­cept: per­fect ensem­ble play­ing, careful inter­ac­tion, lis­tening, trust. Fee­ling the same pul­se makes the groo­ve come ali­ve regard­less of the genre.

“Scen­ted Rus­hes” is a dia­lo­gue bet­ween two fairy-tale worlds, two musi­cal lan­guages. For our debut album, Stein­kog­ler and Butt let them­sel­ves be inspi­red by three gre­at sto­ry-tel­lers and phil­an­thro­pists: Lewis Car­roll, Mau­rice Ravel and Ber­nard Andrès. Not only their works, but also their sen­se of humor, ear­nest­ness and their distas­te for being stuck in a pige­on hole is what attracts DUO OXYMORON to the com­po­ser Mau­rice Ravel and the wri­ter and mathe­ma­ti­ci­an Lewis Car­roll. And they both knew about the importance of blur­ring the lines.

“Scen­ted Rus­hes” is a toun­gue-in-cheek homage to Lewis Car­roll, aut­hor of both Ali­ce novels. To his poe­tic light-hear­ted­ness. To the scen­ted rus­hes always gro­wing out of reach – “almost as if it was on purpose”.

OXYMORON — oppo­si­tes attract

From the very first moment Anna Stein­kog­ler and Valen­tin Butt made music tog­e­ther, they felt a strong musi­cal bond, and the exci­ting desi­re to crea­te some­thing powerful, enthr­al­ling and inten­se­ly emo­tio­nal tog­e­ther. The jux­ta­po­si­ti­on of their instru­ments — harp and accor­di­on — has never felt like ant­ago­nisms, on the con­tra­ry, they attract each other. Their name says it all: OXYMORON.

True musi­ci­an­ship and dedi­ca­ti­on are the keys to Steinkogler’s and Butt’s own com­pel­ling arran­ge­ments. The con­tras­ting per­so­na­li­ties of both musi­ci­ans and instru­ments seem to blend into each other on stage, while main­tai­ning their extre­me posi­ti­ons. Their music is an orga­nic and refres­hing take on the encoun­ter of the well-known and the new-found.

With their own com­po­si­ti­ons, DUO OXYMORON explo­res and expands their aes­the­tics. The lack of musi­cal tra­di­ti­ons or role models for their uncom­mon instru­men­ta­ti­on allows Anna Stein­kog­ler and Valen­tin Butt to deve­lop their own indi­vi­du­al musi­cal language.

 

“If I had a world of my own, ever­y­thing would be non­sen­se. Not­hing would be what it is becau­se ever­y­thing would be what it isn’t. And con­tra­ry wise, what is, it wouldn’t be. And what it wouldn’t be, it would. You see?” — Lewis Car­roll

Reper­toire (excerpt)
Ber­nard Andrés, Parvis
Lui­gi Boc­che­ri­ni, Fan­dan­go (sound­cloud)
Clau­de Debus­sy, Dan­se sacrée et Dan­se profane
César Franck, Pre­lude, Fugue et Varia­ti­on Op. 18
G.F. Hän­del, Suite in c‑moll BWV 446
Astor Piaz­zolla, Tan­gos: Obli­vi­on, Liber­t­an­go, Rem­in­s­zenz (Video)
Mau­rice Ravel, Ma mère l’Oye (Video excerpt (IV La bel­le et la bête)
Anna Stein­kog­ler, Scen­ted Rus­hes (Video excerpt: I The 5th square)
Video

PANAMOUR

Anna Stein­kog­ler &
Liam Mallett

Flu­te and Harp — or the light­ness of being. This com­bi­na­ti­on of instru­ments has been bles­sed throug­hout the ages with music full of ele­gan­ce, fines­se, and grace by com­po­sers all over the world. Liam Mal­lett and Anna Stein­kog­lers’ reper­toire is full of diver­se colours and sounds, meaningful and yet floa­ting melodies.

 
The musi­ci­ans are united by the con­vic­tion that cham­ber music is a tim­e­l­ess art form that needs to be pro­mo­ted and expe­ri­en­ced live in order to sur­vi­ve. Like muse­um cura­tors they choo­se their pro­gram­mes with gre­at care, and gui­de their audi­en­ces through con­certs with a mix of charm and wit. Pana­mo­ur are espe­ci­al­ly inte­res­ted in the jux­ta­po­si­ti­on of epochs and styl­es, crea­ting a rich­ness of colour and tex­tu­re that allows both the flu­te and harp to shine.

 

Liam Mal­lett — Vita

Liam Mal­lett (flu­te), born in Whan­ga­rei (New Zea­land), stu­di­ed flu­te at the Hoch­schu­le für Musik Frei­burg im Breis­gau, at the Musik-Aka­de­mie Basel and at the Uni­ver­si­tät der Küns­te Ber­lin. His main inte­rests are orches­tral music, late Roman­ti­cism and con­tem­po­ra­ry music.

Sin­ce his stu­dies Liam Mal­lett has been working as a free­lan­ce musi­ci­an. He has work­ed with inter­na­tio­nal orchestras such as the Gothen­burg Sym­pho­ny Orches­tra, the Gothen­burg Ope­ra Orches­tra, the Pots­dam Cham­ber Aca­de­my, the NDR Elb­phil­har­mo­nie Orches­tra, the Comic Ope­ra Orches­tra, the Ber­lin Phil­har­mo­nic Orches­tra, the Came­ra­ta Bern, the Basel Sym­pho­ny Orches­tra and with renow­ned con­duc­tors like Sir Simon Ratt­le, Chris­toph Eschen­bach, Nee­me Jär­vi and Gustavo Dudamel.

As a cham­ber musi­ci­an, soloist and lec­tu­rer he has given con­certs in Ame­ri­ca, Mexi­co, Ukrai­ne and many Euro­pean count­ries. He was a mem­ber of the Aca­de­my of Komi­sche Oper.

Reper­toire (excerpt)

Bar­tok, Rumä­ni­sche Volks­tän­ze
Bert­ho­mieu, Cinq Nuan­ces
Bizet, Car­men Suite
Cou­perin, Le Ros­si­gnol en Amour
Debus­sy, En Bateau
Elgar, Salut d’A­mour
Fau­ré, Fan­tai­sie Op. 79
Fau­ré, Sici­li­en­ne
Got­kovs­ky, Eolièn­ne
Ibe­rt, Ent­r’ac­te
Jon­gen, Dan­se Len­te
Marais, La Folia
Mol­nar, Phan­ta­sie über japa­ni­sche Volks­lie­der
Piaz­zolla, His­toire du Tan­go
Ros­si­ni, Andan­te und Varia­tio­nen
Rust, Sona­te
Satie, Gym­no­pé­die
Sib­inga, Trois Images
Shan­kar, L’Au­be Enchan­tée
Tak­emit­su, Towards the Sea

Vide­os

Audio

Harp duo

Anna Stein­kog­ler &
Lucie Del­haye

Lucie Del­haye and Anna Stein­kog­ler are both con­vin­ced that the­re is still much to be done for their bel­oved instru­ment when it comes to pro­mo­ting the harp bey­ond well-known cli­ches.  When per­forming as soloists, both per­for­mers were often struck by the audience’s sur­pri­sed reac­tion to the harp: the­re is so much more to it than ange­lic ethe­re­al sounds!

Reper­toire, ampli­tu­de, son­o­ri­ty, play­ing tech­ni­ques and colours are much more diver­se than expected.

Inspi­red by the many ques­ti­ons they often have to ans­wer after a solo reci­tal, and the posi­ti­ve sur­pri­se and inte­rest they awa­ken in their audi­ence, Lucie Del­haye and Anna Stein­kog­ler set them­sel­ves two goals when start­ing to work together.

On the one hand: play­ing cham­ber music at a very high level and enjoy­ing the gre­at pos­si­bi­li­ties of reper­toire that open up when com­bi­ning two harps, which is like mer­ging two cham­ber orchestras into one big sym­pho­ny orchestra.

 

Reper­toire (excerpt)

G.F. Hän­del: Kon­zert in B‑Dur
Boc­che­ri­ni: Fan­dan­go
Schu­bert: Sere­na­de / Vier Länd­ler
Ravel: Ma mère l’Oye
Gra­na­dos: Spa­ni­scher Tanz Nr. 5
And­res: Par­vis
Debus­sy: Clair de Lune
Debus­sy: Dan­ses sacrée et profane

Video

NEWSLETTER

SAITENBLICKE — BEHIND THE SCENES

AUF der Büh­ne zu ste­hen ist fan­tas­tisch — gebün­del­te Ener­gie die einen Augen­blick lang sicht­bar wird!

Was jedoch nicht im Schein­wer­fer­licht statt­fin­det, das WIE und WARUM, beleuch­te ich in die­sem Newsletter…