related works
Genre:
Vocal music
Subgenre:
Mixed choir and orchestra
Scoring:
sopr alt bas GK4 fl fl(pic) 2ob 2cl 2fg 4h 3trp 3trb tb timp 3-4perc str(12.10.8.8.6.)
Genre:
Vocal music
Subgenre:
Mixed choir and orchestra
Scoring:
recit 6soloists GK4 2120 1100 timp perc g hp str
Hasseltsch meilied : voor 4-stemmig gemengd koor en orkest, 1981 / Herman Strategier
Genre:
Vocal music
Subgenre:
Mixed choir and orchestra
Scoring:
GK4 2222 2200 timp str
Genre:
Vocal music
Subgenre:
Mixed choir and orchestra
Scoring:
recit alt ten bas GK4 3334 4332 3perc vibr hp pf str(0.13.10.8.)
composition
Anne Frank cantate : a child of light, for soprano, contralto, bass, mixed chorus and orchestra, 1984, revision 2001 / Hans Kox
Other authors:
Kox, Hans
(Composer)
Description:
Program note (English): Memories of World War II have been of paramount importance in a number of my works. That became apparent in my work In Those Days (1969), as a result of the Battle of Arnhem written in commission for the airborne committee and the Prins Bernhard Funds. This work received the Prix Italia. Thereafter, in 1971, I wrote at the request of the International Organ Days in Haarlem and in commission for C.R.M. a second work in which the war and is destructive impact, now in broader link, was again central in the 'Requiem for Europe'. As a closure to these deliberations concerning 'war art' can be heard in my Anne Frank Cantata, concluding a musical triptych. Thanks to a commission from the NCRV, and especially the head of the music department , Cornelis van Zwol, playing a stimulating role, I could bring this work to fruition. It was, as it happens, already a long me cherished wish to use the diary of Anne Frank as a main point for a work for soloists, choir and orchestra. As a result
of copyright difficulties I was not allowed to use the diary, parts of which would be set in the person of a narrator in the cantata.
Instead I have, following 'some' research, made another plan for the text composition: the anecdotic element is replaced by an progression which is founded in the (un)safe world history. A parallel has been drawn between a number of events taking place in the centuries B.C. (as described in the book of Esther from the Old Testament and interpreted alto soloist) and the outrageous history of the last fifty years (marked by quotations by Hitler and the SS on the KL Auschwitz: bass soloist). The links are all the more frightening because humanity has apparently (not) be able to repair the damages. The choir functions not only as the 'turbae', but also as a bewildered observer asking the only question that, in whatever context, can always be raised: "What then is humanity?" The soprano soloist expresses the independent thinking of mankind as an individual (in this case Anne Frank). The alto and bass solo connect themselves through their recitatives. Lastly the orchestra symbolises the
connection, the cement that keeps the different layers of the piece together. - HANS KOX (1985)