Drei Haikus (Three Haiku) (1995)

Michael Grill (b. 1955) — Drei Haikus (Three Haiku) (1995) for organ

1) The thunder’s voice
has through the summer rain
gained strength

2) The Great Budda
dozing to himself
the long spring day

3) One fell,
now the second one has fallen—
camellias

“Drei Haikus” (Three Haiku) (1995) are based on poems of Masaoka Shiki (1867–1902), a Japanese poet of the Meiji period and an important figure in the development of modern haiku. Grill writes: “The organ pieces are not ‘settings’ of the poems in the sense of trying to be musical replicas of the text. Rather this music is an attempt to reflect the ‘echo’ that the haiku is meant to cause in the reader, drawing from the philosophy of Zen Buddhism: listen and hold.”

German composer and organist Michael Grill (b. 1955) was educated in Munich where his teachers included Karl Richter. He served in Munich as director of music at the Andreaskirche and the Erlöserkirche. As an organist, Grill has concertized throughout Europe, Israel, South America, and the USA. His primary musical interests involve the interpretation and composition of contemporary music and the history of church music in Munich. On the latter subject, he published a book tracing the history of Protestant church music in the city from 1799–1999.

Published by Strube Verlag