Vienna’s St. Stephen’s Cathedral becomes a musical instrument like Lucerne’s churches
Published: Thursday, Nov 23rd 2023, 09:30
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In the current pre-Christmas period, the New Music Festival Wien Modern is playing practically all over Vienna - including St. Stephen's Cathedral. As in Lucerne in summer 2020, Swiss percussionist Peter Conradin Zumthor has prepared bells for a sound installation that will fill the entire city center with sound.
On Wednesday evening, St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna was transformed into a gigantic musical instrument: "Domglocken con sordino" is the name of Zumthor's half-hour sound installation.
The performance by St. Stephen's Cathedral was the second part of a double concert. The composer had already transformed the bells of Klosterneuburg Abbey into a musical instrument on Sunday. Both works were part of the Vienna Modern sub-festival, which is being curated this year by Zumthor's father, star architect Peter Zumthor. Meanwhile, son Peter Conradin Zumthor has long since worked his way out of his father's shadow as a percussionist.
For "Domglocken con sordino", the clappers of eleven bells in the south tower of St. Stephen's Cathedral, some of which weigh several hundred kilograms, and seven more in the north tower have now been fitted with dampers - i.e. con sordino. Specifically, they have been wrapped with tire material.
This results in an almost electronic sound that rises almost imperceptibly until an identifiable bell sound then almost hesitantly emerges. This transposition of the bells subtly succeeds over the course of the half-hour work in making the very sound that city dwellers usually block out present again.
Zumthor took exactly the same approach in Lucerne in summer 2020. Entitled "Lucerne bells - con sordino", he used 17 bells from four Lucerne churches for a 75-minute composition.
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