Ballett 3 & 4

Klaus Schulze talks about Ballett: Apart from Ballett 1 & 2 the Contemporary Works -box also contained Ballett 3 and Ballett 4. These four pieces were originally intended to be one composition in honour to my mother who had been a ballet dancer and had died in 1998. I never assumed that the ballet would be performed with dancing. Then I would have to cut down to about 15 or 20 minutes and would probably have to throw away all my favourite parts! The music could have had another title but since it was the first production I did after the death of my mother, I called it Ballett and just numbered the four parts.

Cellist Wolfang Tiepold's contribution to the track Agony, he developed himself, which is why I gave him a compositional credit. I first met Tiepold in the summer of 1978 during the production of X in Panne-Paulsen studios, Frankfurt/Main, where I had previously recorded Moondawn (1976). For X, I really wanted an orchestra, but most of all a cello. Eberhard Panne knew Tiepold from his recordings with the Hessian Radio Orchestra that have been made at Panne-Paulsen. He called Tiepold, we talked and then he came in and performed brilliantly. He also conducted the orchstra, because the conductor wasn't able to manage the musicians while keeping in time with my sequencers. So Tiepold in some ways saved X for me. Since then he is my special cellist and whenever I need a cello, I call Tiepold. Because of the cello, the songs of course have a slightly classical feeling. But: No! Though I like to connect electronic music with classical sound and structures, I won't suddenly start to compose classically. Just as I won't publish the many poems I had written before doing my German studies, or exhibit Sunday paintings like McCartney. I will also never write an autobiography; I stick to that which I'm good at. I never had any hobbies besides music, wether it be painting or writing. I always made music