Helikopter-Streichquartett

The Helikopter-Streichquartett (English: Helicopter String Quartet) is one of 's best-known pieces, and one of the most complex to perform. It involves a string quartet, four helicopters with pilots, as well as audio and video equipment and technicians. It was first performed and recorded in 1995. Although performable as a self-sufficient piece, it also forms the third scene of the opera Mittwoch aus Licht ("Wednesday from Light").

The Helicopter Quartet was originally commissioned by Professor Hans Landesmann of the Salzburger Festspiele in early 1991 (, 214). Stockhausen's initial reaction was that he was not interested in writing a string quartet, but then one night he dreamed he was flying above four helicopters, each carrying a member of a string quartet; he could see into and through the transparent helicopters (Dirmeikis 1999, 21–22). He subsequently made some sketches and plans, but it was not until 1992–93 that he found the time to compose the quartet (, 214). By this time, he had had several more dreams concerning the piece, including one involving a swarm of bees and a violinist, about which Stockhausen said, “The buzzing made by lots of bees is a magic sound to me” (Schweitzer 2008). The Arditti Quartet was to play the première. After Stockhausen finished his score, it was sent back to Professor Landesmann for criticism. His reaction was positive, as was that of the Director of the Festspiele, Gerard Mortier. A long series of negotiations started with the Festspiele and the Austrian army, who were to lend the helicopters, as well as various TV channels who were airing the piece. In part because of protests by the Austrian Green Party, that it would be "absolutely impossible for Austrian air to be polluted by performing this Stockhausen", in the end the planned 1994 première had to be cancelled (, 90).

The first performances of the piece took place in Amsterdam on 26 June 1995, as part of the Holland Festival, with Alouette helicopters from the Royal Dutch Air Force display team, The Grasshoppers. The performers were: first violinist Irvine Arditti and pilot Marco Oliver; second violinist Graeme Jennings and pilot Lieutenant Denis Jans; violist Garth Knox and pilot Lieutenant Robert de Lange; cellist Rohan de Saram and pilot Captain Erik Boekelman (, 216). There were three performances given, at the Westergasfabriek, after two test flights at the same location the day before, and several earlier at an airfield in Deelen for the purpose of trying out the microphones (, 90). Following these performances, Stockhausen revised the score, adding about three minutes of material near the end, just before the descent, increasing the overall duration from about 29 minutes to 32 minutes (, 91). Since its premiere, the Helicopter Quartet has been performed "fairly regularly" and has become "the most iconic piece of classical music from the 1990s", though it was not presented in its full context, as the third scene of Mittwoch aus Licht, until the opera's staged premiere in August 2012 (Fallows 2012, 1284).

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