Jörg Widmann on “Teufel Amor” (9 min.)

Jörg Widmann is one of the most successful composers of the younger generation, also, as a clarinetist who performs all over the world, he is unusually well acquainted with the technical and tonal possibilities of orchestral instruments. After the Berliner Philharmoniker premiered Widmann’s first piano concerto in December 2014, June of 2015 saw another performance of a large-scale work by the composer: Widmann’s “symphonic hymnus” Teufel Amor, conducted by Daniel Barenboim. The 2012 work, premiered by the Vienna Philharmonic, refers to an eponymous poem fragment of Friedrich Schiller, of which nothing but the lines “Sweet Amor, remain / In melodic flight” has survived. In this introduction to the work, Widmann explains what fascinates him about this text, and the background of the work’s composition.