Barbara Heller

Inner Dialogue

Barbara Heller composed Inner Dialogue with a sound material made up of several interval series, which are put together in a dialogue-like manner. The composer focuses on upward and downward movements. Barbara Heller writes: "I was particularly emotionally connected to one interval series, it can be found at the beginning of the 2nd part (Lento) and the 5th part (Calmo): major sixth, minor second, fourth, major second and tritone. This falling sixth triggered in me the attempt to come up again after the semitone step downwards with a rising fourth, and then down again with the whole tone and the tritone – this resulted in an expression that did not let go of me and touched me strongly inside. It was like a trap that I couldn't get out of. And so, in the course of working on the cello piece, it became an inner dialogue: with the back and forth down and up again, a kind of variation-like music, which again and again – with small changes – was a self-questioning, an attempt to redeem myself from this "motif", which I did not succeed in." In this issue, editor Beverley Ellis provides important information on interpretation.