11,000 Saiten – Holland Festival

Fifty pianos in a large circle in the Gashouder in Amsterdam. They form the starting point for an overwhelming composition, sometimes of ethereal beauty and at other times swelling menacingly to a thundering roar.

11,000 Saiten, “11,000 Strings,” is the name of this new outsized composition by grandmaster Georg Friedrich Haas. Klangforum Wien asked him to compose a piece for the ensemble and fifty pianos. The idea for this project came about when, during a visit to a Chinese piano factory, ensemble-intendant Peter Paul Kainrath was blown off his socks by the sound of dozens of pianos that, to test them, were played simultaneously, mechanically. Haas responded enthusiastically to the request and developed the idea into an impressive, emotional listening journey, like music to an invisible film.

In 11,000 Saiten, each of the fifty pianos is tuned pure on its own, but in relation to each other they are ‘tuned’ in very small steps: each piano sounds 1/50 of a semitone higher. This creates a surround ‘piano orchestra’ that, especially in combination with the phenomenal instrumentalists of Klangforum, offers an immense palette of sound: from pure piano sound and timbres, which you would swear come from a synthesizer, to pure noise and penetrating thunder. Add to that the art of Haas, who never forgets the human touch in his experimentation, plus the monumental atmosphere of the gasholder: good for an unforgettable experience.

‘This really is such a crazy idea that there is no option but to say “Yes!”‘
– Georg Friedrich Haas