For the past 2 days I've been listening to my latest acquisition - a wonderful disc of Karl Henning's music recently released by the "Henning's Classics" label (in the "Charles Disques" series). And what a pleasant addition to my collection it is! Some truly remarkable music. I was expecting some strong Shostakovitch influences but to my surprise found none to speak of (if there is anything noticeable of that sort, then it is a faint Stravinskyan streak
). I'm especially fond of
Hodie Christus natus est, where the sound of the clarinet beautifully blends with the sound of the choir,
I Sang to the Sky, and Day Broke with some great interplay between percussion and wind ensemble, and also
Murmur of Many Waters with a very colorful percussion. The opening of
Nuhro is also quite striking and very beautiful, as is the whole piece, and in fact every piece on the CD I'm speaking of.
My wife was mightily impressed too. As for my daughter, many of you may already know that she has very discerning tastes. She will only dance to the music of Xenakis and Norgard, and so far was not given to the absent minded art of humming. However, this all changed the minute the afore mentioned CD started playing. For some unfathomable reason, Rose wanted to sing along with the choir the moment she heard it (and for the first time too!), and kept this up for quite a while. So I am pleased to report that she adores the music as well.
Listening to all these wonderful pieces I became curious of the composer himself and so conducted a google search, hoping for a decent image. The following 2 came up quite high in the results (check for yourselves!), so I gather they're a good likeness (presumably the first shows him with a member of his family):
Cheers,
Maciek
