'composing - with the hands': Stravinsky''s and Grisey''s arrangements of songs by Hugo Wolf

How is Stravinky still recognisable even if he “merely” transcribes someone else’s work and orchestrates almost without changing pitch and rhythm? What technical procedures enable him to add a certain haptic and physical feel to the sound? As Wolfgang Rihm once said, Stravinsky formed music – even that of others – with his big hands to suit it to his own image and thereby paving two ways: one historical and the other personal. Both of these lead to Venice. This essay concentrates on the analysis of Stravinsky\''s Two sacred songs from 1968. An accurate profile may be given to the results by comparing them with the orchestration (written for nearly the same instruments) which is realized in Gérard Grisey’s Wolf-Lieder from 1997. Works from the German-Austrian compositional tradition conflict both with Stravinsky’s and Grisey’s arrangements on account of a sensitivity to timbre that dates from an originally French tradition of orchestration. It will be shown that counterpoint can effectively become a neutralizing agent in this clash of cultures