Zephyr (2024)
for solo cello
Zephyr takes its name from the gentle west wind of Greek mythology, often associated with the arrival of spring. The piece was inspired by the sensation of balmy spring air in motion: never entirely still, yet rarely forceful, constantly reshaping its contours through subtle fluctuations of energy and direction.
At the heart of the work lies a reimagining of material from my ongoing Spiccato series for solo string instruments. Here, the bouncing bow stroke becomes more than a technical device; it serves as a source of kinetic energy from which the music continuously unfolds. Repeated gestures, delicate variations, and shifting layers of resonance create a musical landscape that hovers between perpetual motion and song, between physical action and poetic suggestion.
Zephyr was composed for the cellist Katharina Gross as part of Cello Mondo, her ambitious dream project to commission and perform new solo cello works from composers across the globe. The project celebrates the extraordinary expressive possibilities of the solo cello while fostering artistic encounters across cultures, generations, and aesthetic traditions.
For me, the work also carries a personal significance. My collaboration with Katharina began in 2011 with Persistent Memory, a solo cello work that later became one of the seeds from which the Cello Mondo project grew. More than a decade later, Zephyr returns to the solo cello not as a continuation of that earlier piece, but as a reflection on artistic continuity itself. If Persistent Memory explored the traces left behind by experience, Zephyr turns toward renewal: the gentle arrival of new energy, new perspectives, and new beginnings.
In this sense, the spring wind of the title becomes more than a natural image. It serves as a metaphor for a creative journey sustained over many years—one shaped by friendship, collaboration, and the enduring capacity of music to reinvent itself while carrying its memories forward.
Zephyr received its premiere and first release as part of Cello Mondo #4.
recording: https://h1.nu/1qN3J
Inside @Kunsthalle Trier (DE) - 23 May 2026
