Aeolus (2016)

Gernot Wurst (b. 1979) — Aeolus (2016) for organ

This piece is subtitled “Remembering the Wind’s Song” and is a reflection on an experience the composer and his wife had. He writes: “When my wife and I moved into our current apartment in 2008, the first thing we did is to clean the carpet. It took about two days for it to dry, and since it was August, and the nights were warm, we put a mattress out on the terrace and spent these nights outdoors. I remember it well: There was a warm summer’s night breeze, and we spent ours watching the stars above us. Whenever the wind rose up, the open metal tubes on the facade of the buildings in the vicinity started playing melodies in natural harmonic tones. It was one of the most beautiful things we have ever heard.”

Gernot Wurst (b. 1979) was born in Heilbronn, South Germany. After graduating from Albert Schweitzer Academic High School in Neckarsulm, he studied Medical Informatics at Heidelberg University. His research concentration is in digital signal and image processing, and he is currently completing a PhD at the German Cancer Research Center in Heidelberg. Wurst began music lessons at age six, and has been a church musician and organist since 1992. He studied music as an external student at the Hochschule für Kirchenmusik in Rottenburg, during which time he participated in the TRUESOUND EU pipe organ research project, developing an organ pipe specific sound analysis system. He is currently a part-time organist at St. Kilian Heilbronn and Mariä Himmelfahrt Kochertürn. Wurst is also the director of Prospectum, a firm that has produced virtual pipe organ models of several significant European organs.

Published by Zimbel Press in “Three Calm Pieces”