Amour (Stockhausen)


Amour is a cycle of five pieces for clarinet by Karlheinz Stockhausen, composed in 1974-76. The composer thought of each piece as a gift for a close friend. The cycle is given the number 44 in Stockhausen's catalogue of works.

History

The first piece of the cycle was composed in 1974 while Stockhausen was vacationing in Senegal, at N'Gor, a beach resort near Dakar; the rest were composed during a week in December 1976, in Kürten, Germany, as Christmas gifts for family members and close associates.
Amour was first performed publicly on 9 January 1978, in Stuttgart, by Suzanne Stephens. In 1981 Stockhausen created a flute version of the cycle, which was followed by a cello arrangement of Vier Sterne weisen Dir den Weg in 1998, and a saxophone version of the entire cycle, created in 2003.