JAVS Summer 2018

Feature Article

Henze’s Sonata for Viola and Piano: A Personal View Peter Sheppard Skærved

I have been playing Hans Werner Henze’s Sonata for Viola and Piano (1979) for eighteen years. My exploration of this extraordinary piece began with a performance in Hanover in 2000, as part of a concert where I played all of Henze’s works for solo violin, violin and piano, and viola in one day, at the composer’s invitation. is summer, I released my rst recording of the sonata, with the violin sonatas, on Naxos (Naxos: 8573886). is follows two previous discs of the violin concerti, the first of which was nominated for a Grammy in 2007. I make no apology for writing about Henze’s music from a very personal point of view. It is quite impossible for me to write about his music dispassionately. Every aspect of his art, from its searing expression to its élan, are reflections of the composer’s multi-faceted, complex personality. I was fortunate to work very closely with him from a comparatively young age, and to witness, at close range, how he poured himself into his music. Henze, who was incapable of writing a note which did not reflect his emotional and psychological states, demanded that his collaborating performers respond with complimentary candour and commitment. Now that time has passed, I can more comfortably observe that there was a signi cant di erence between the way that Henze worked with musicians one-to-one, and in larger, more professional circumstances. is observation holds true for many composers, and not just those who are or were active performers. Put simply, the more ‘professional’ the circumstances of creation, collaboration, rehearsal and performance, the less likely that something personal will be essayed, on both sides. is is a question of intimacy, and by its very de nition, intimacy su ers when it is communicated in a public sphere.

Henze’s response to the players that he trusted was essentially private, but was revealed, if one chose to look listen and carefully, in his approach to the colour, timbre, texture and rhetoric of the music written for his close collaborators. Figure 1. Peter Sheppard Skærved, left, with Henze, right. Photo taken in Germany in 1989, when the author was 22 years old.

Sound Inspirations and the Origins of the Sonata

e sonata was inspired by the extraordinary sound and charisma of the violist Garth Knox. The work was premiered in the spring of 1980 at the Wittener Tage für neue Kammermusik by Knox with the pianist/conductor, Jan Latham-Koenig. e ‘voice’ of the viola in this sonata,

Journal of the American Viola Society / Vol. 34, 2018 Online Issue

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