Edition Schott

The content and formal structure of the two-movement Poem have been subjectively borrowed from the poem Steps [Stufen] by Hermann Hesse. The frequently appearing short motifs in both parts of the work are based in "magic formulaic style" on the parable of the Glass Bead Game which in the ring for the game with coloured beads becomes a game with symbols. Magic and dreams, a sense of departure and grievance and valediction and transfiguration are the moods which follow one another, frequently in rapid succession - fundamentally the thirst for life and the yearning for sorrow and consummation.
Instrumentation : cello and 13 solo-strings op. 80