Composition commission issued to Helmut Oehring

Festival Sine Nomine, Lausanne, Switzerland

Copies of the film Sunrise circulated both with and without sound. Music for the Los Angeles premiere came care of R.H Bassett and Carli Elinor while in New York it was Erno Rapee. 1928 saw the advent of Hugo Riesenfeld’s film score which the DVD now currently on sale is set to. The film score always sounded different depending on whether it was played by an orchestra, on the piano or on a movie theater organ. As a potpourri of existing and newly composed music this background music remains stuck in its own era.
With its unbroken power and modernity Murnau’s timeless masterpiece is not only tied to this music – handed down to us only in part – but it is also ideal for inspiring a new tonal language. The relationship between the silent movie and music seems an interesting and exciting one here. Images alone can create a tone and music can be silent in a way.
The festival Sine Nomine asked the composer Helmut Oehring to write a new score for Murnau’s Sunrise. He has chosen a line-up with nine musicians, a string quartet, piano, trumpet, bass clarinet, a voice part and double bass. This composition commission has been issued with the support of the Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation.

October 4, 2013
Cinéma Capitole, Lausanne, Switzerland

Further Information:
www.quatuorsinenomine.ch