Jubiläum

Jubiläum (Jubilee) is an orchestral composition by , work-number 45 in the composer’s catalogue of works.

Jubiläum is a relatively short work of about 15 minutes duration, written in 1977 on commission for the 125th-anniversary celebration of the Hannover Opera House, and has therefore been called Stockhausen’s "Operatic Festival Overture" (Griffiths 1980). It was premiered on 10 October 1977 by the Regional Orchestra of Lower Saxony, conducted by George Albrecht. In February 1980 Stockhausen revised the score, and this version was first performed on 9 May 1980 at the Royal Festival Hall, London, by the Philharmonia Orchestra conducted by Andrew Davis (Kurtz 1992, 208–209; , 126). The score is dedicated to Péter Eötvös.

In Jubiläum, Stockhausen composed an orchestral sound event with superimposed layers of different speeds, degrees of noise, degrees of indeterminacy and integration, and simultaneous transitions from ordered to disordered and back (Maconie 2005, 390). The work is built upon a formula, announced at the beginning as a massive hymn-like chant in the brass and low strings. The harmonic language of Jubiläum is reminiscent of the music of Stockhausen’s teacher Olivier Messiaen, and the dramatic use of space recalls Hector Berlioz. The formula is presented mainly in a series of dense textures overlaid with shimmering glissandos and rapid melodic figurations, in a "mix of majestic confidence and restless activity" that produces a quality of "breathtaking splendour that is Stockhausen's alone" (Griffiths 1980).

The formula of Jubiläum is in the guise of a chorale with a melody containing 15 pitches grouped into five segments of 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 5 tones:

The five segments have durations of 2, 3 (1 + 2), 6 (3 + 1 + 2), 10 (2 + 4 +1 + 3), and 15 (4 + 1 + 2 + 3 + 5) crotchets, and each is followed by a "coloured silence" of 2, 3, 4, 6, and 9 crotchets. These colourations are made in the lower instruments (horns, violas, cellos) by overtone glissandos, in the middle register by natural-harmonic glissandos in the violins, and in the highest register by arpeggios on five triangles and a set of glass chimes (, 127).

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