Helmut Lachenmann

Marche fatale

Marche fatale is a incautiously daring escapade that may annoy the fans of my compositions more than my earlier works, many of which have prevailed only after scandals at their world premieres. My Marche fatale has, though, little stylistically to do with my previous compositional path; it presents itself without restraint, if not as a regression, then still as a recourse to those empty phrases to which modern civilization still clings in its daily 'utility' music, whereas music in the 20th and 21st centuries has long since advanced to new, unfamiliar soundscapes and expressive possibilities.

The key term is 'banality.' As creators we despise it, we try to avoid it - though we are not safe from the cheap banal even within new aesthetic achievements.