Volker Bertelmann aka Hauschka

© Carsten Sander

Biography

Before he became known as an Oscar-nominated composer, producer and pianist, Volker Bertelmann had long been keen to absorb countless influences and push his creative limits, experimenting at an early age already with just how different he could make the piano sound through preparations.

While Bertelmann has made a name for himself as solo artist Hauschka – performing extensively and producing music at a prodigious rate – much of his work has come in partnership, be that for theatre, dance, TV or film. He has recorded with the Grammy Award-winning violinist Hilary Hahn, and composed for soloists like mandolinist Avi Avital  and Nicolas Altstaedt (cello) as well as for ensembles and orchestras, among others alongside the experimental Icelandic band múm for the MDR Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra as their artist in residence.

In 2016, Bertelmann joined forces with Dustin O’Halloran to score Garth Davis’s film Lion. The soundtrack was awarded an AACTA Award and nominated for an Academy Award, Golden Globe, and BAFTA. Bertelmann’s latest scores include the music for TV shows such as the Emmy- and BAFTA nominated mini-series Patrick Melrose (2018), Gunpowder (2017), Dublin Murders, Your Honor (2019) and for the feature films Summerland, Stowaway, and Downhill (2020). Since 2018, Volker Bertelmann is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.


Discography

Solo

(selection)

A Different Forest, 2019
Sony Classical

What If, 2017
City Slang, Temporary Residence

A NDO CY, 2015
Temporary Residence

Abandoned City, 2014
City Slang

Foreign Landscapes, 2010
Label: Fat Cat 

Snowflakes & Car Wrecks, 2009
Label: Fat Cat

Ferndorf, 2008
Label: Fat Cat

Room To Expand, 2007
Label: Fat Cat

Versions Of The Prepared Piano – Remixes, 2007
Various Artists
Label: Karaoke Kalk

The Prepared Piano, 2005
Label: Karaoke Kalk

Substantial, 2004
Label: Karaoke Kalk

Band

Tonetraeger: „Wortbrot“, 2007
OST: Hauschka & Torsten Mauss
Label: Strawberry Kills

Music A.M.: „Unwound From The Wood”, 2006
Production and Music: Hauschka, Luke Sutherland, Stefan Schneider
Label: Quatermass

Music A.M.: „My City Glittered Like A Breaking Wave”, 2005
Production and Music: Hauschka, Luke Sutherland, Stefan Schneider
Label: Quatermass

Music A.M.: „A Heart & Two Stars“, 2004
Production and Music: Hauschka, Luke Sutherland, Stefan Schneider
Label: Quatermass

Tonetraeger: „This Is Not Here“, 2004
Production and Music: Hauschka & Torsten Mauss
Label: Quatermass

Tonetraeger: „Spieleabend“, 2002
Production and Music: Hauschka & Torsten Mauss
Label: Spinner Ace Records

Orchestral Works

Materials, 2016
for prepared piano, percussion, string ensemble and tape
Commissioned by Folkwang Kammerorchester Essen

I Slag and Coke
II Phase Transition 1
III Octenol
IV Phase Transition 2
V Iron

World Premiere: 20 January 2017
Zeche Zollverein, Essen

Hauschka, prepared piano
Kai Angermann, percussion
WARPED TYPE - Andreas Huck, Roland Nebe, visuals
Folkwang Kammerorchester Essen
Johannes Klumpp, conductor



Orchestral pieces commissioned by mdr, Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk

Drowning, 2015
(múm and Hauschka)
7 separate pieces, each with a different orchestration:
I    - In Daylight (múm)
II   - In Rippling Ink (Hauschka)
III  - In a Bathtub on a Hilltop (múm)
IV  - In Your Flesh (Hauschka)
V   - In Anonymous Waves (múm)
VI  - In Hushed Decent (Hauschka)
VII - In Nightlight (múm)

World Premiere 27 June 2015
Gewandhaus Leipzig


Cascades, 2014
orchestral work in 3 movements, approx. 30 minutes
World Premiere 20 January 2015
Gewandhaus Leipzig


1. Loss (for large mixed choir)
2. From Ashes (for large orchestra)
3. Perspective (for large orchestra and mixed choir)

Hauschka: piano
MDR Radio Choir
MDR Symphony Orchestra
conductor: Kristjan Järvi

Children
World Premiere 11 September 2014
Jazzfest Leipzig
MDR Symphony Orchestra
conductor Kristjan Järvi


Madeira
World Premiere 11 September 2014
Jazzfest Leipzig
MDR Symphony Orchestra
conductor Kristjan Järvi


Penn Station
World Premiere 11 September 2014
Jazzfest Leipzig
MDR Symphony Orchestra
conductor Kristjan Järvi


Puppen
World Premiere 11 September 2014
Jazzfest Leipzig
MDR Symphony Orchestra
conductor Kristjan Järvi


Film

Stowaway, 2021
Directed by Joe Penna

Your Honor
, 2020
Directed by Edward Berger

Home, 2020
Directed by Franka Potente

Ammonite, 2020
Directed by Franics Lee

Downhill, 2020
Directed by Nat Faxon & Jim Rash

The Old Guard, 2020
Directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood
co-composed w/ Dustin O'Halloran

Summerland, 2020
Directed by Jessica Swale

When Hitler stole Pink Rabbit (Als Hitler das rosa Kaninchen stahl), 2019
Directed by Caroline Link

Cunningham, 2019
Directed by Alla Kovgan

The Perfect Candidate, 2019
Directed by Haifaa Al Mansour

Upstream, 2019
Directed by Rob Petit

Dialogue Earth, 2019
Directed by Hank Levine

A Christmas Carol, 2019
Directed by Nick Murphy
Music co-composed w/ Dustin O'Halloran

The Dublin Murders, 2019/20
Directed by Saul Dibb a.o.

The Name of the Rose, 2019
Directed by Giacomo Battiato

The Art of Racing in the Rain, 2019
Directed by Simon Curtis
Music co-composed w/ Dustin O'Halloran

All My Loving, 2018/19
Directed by Edward Berger


Nachts im Park 4D, 2018
Directed by Benedikt Niemann
Animation, Short


Adrift, 2018
Director: Baltasar Kormákur

Gut gegen Nordwind, 2018
Director: Vanessa Jopp

Was uns nicht umbringt, 2018
Director: Sandra Nettelbeck

The Current War, 2017
Director: Alfonso Gomez-Rejon

Gunpowder
, 2017
Director: J Blakeson

Patrick Melrose
, 2017
Director: Edward Berger

Hotel Mumbai, 2017
Director:
Anthony Maras

AlphaGo, 2017
Director: Greg Kohs

Ashes in the Snow, 2017
Director:
Marius Markevicius

In Dubious Battle, 2016
Director: James Franco

Lion, 2016
Director: Garth Davis
Nominations "Best Original Score": Golden Globe, BAFTA Award, Oscar

Tausend Arten, den Regen zu beschreiben, 2016
Director: Isabel Prahl

Exodus - Where I Come From is Disappearing, 2016
Director: Hank Levine

DEUTSCHLAND. DEIN SELBSTPORTRÄT, 2015
Director: Sönke Wortmann

The Boy, 2015
Director: Craig MacNeill

Praia do Futuro, 2014
Director: Karim Aïnouz

Farewell, Herr Schwarz, 2014
Director: Yael Reuveny

Horses, 2013
Director: Stephanie Martin

Bliss, 2012
Director: Doris Dörrie

In Between a Kiss, 2009
Director: Reza Rameri

Morgenrot, 2009
Director: Jeff Desom

Höhere Gewalt, 2008
Director: Lars Henning Jung

Bloksky, 2008
Director: Jeff Desom,
Actor & Music: Hauschka

Wortbrot, 2007
Director: Estelle Klawitter
Film Score: Hauschka & Torsten Mauss

Theatre

The Ballad of the Flying Dutchman, 2014
Director: Sebastian Baumgarten
based on Hauff, Heine, Hudtwalcker, Fitzball, Marryat and Wagner
Deutsches Schauspielhaus Hamburg

Puppen, 2011
Director: Kevin Rittberger
Music: Hauschka and Stefan Schneider
Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus

Die Marquise von O., 2010
Director: Kevin Rittberger
Text: Heinrich von Kleist
Ruhrfestspiele Recklinghausen

Wagner-Hörschule, 2006
Director: Sebastian Baumgarten
Remix of Parsifal
Hebbel am Ufer, Berlin

Dance

Where there's form, 2019
Choreography: Aszure Barton
Music: Volker Bertelmann
Kampnagel Hamburg

Totality in Parts, 2018
Choreography: Lukáš Timulak
Composition: Volker Bertelmann
Royal Swedish Ballet Stockholm

ANNNA3. The Worlds of Infinite Shifts, 2018
Choreography: Alexandra Waierstall
Composition: Volker Bertelmann
Beethovenfest Bonn

A City Seeking its Bodies, 2015
Choreography: Alexandra Waierstall
Composition and piano: Volker Bertelmann/ Hauschka
tanzhaus nrw

Hauschka & Edivaldo Ernesto:
An encounter of improvised music & dance, 2013
Piano and Electronics: Hauschka
Dance: Edivaldo Ernesto
Radialsystem V Berlin
EXIT Festival International, MAC Créteil (2014)
Gdansk Dance Festival (2014)
ZKM Karlsruhe (2014)
Dresden Music Festival (2018)

DanceWork Orange, 2009
Choreography: Stephen Shropshire
Theater Augsburg

© Peter Gwiazda

ORCHESTRAL WORK

MATERIALS

Composed by Volker Bertelmann
Commissioned by Folkwang Kammerorchester Essen




Commissioned by Folkwang Kammerorchester Essen, Volker Bertelmann’s composition for prepared piano, percussion and string orchestra had its world premiere at Zeche Zollverein in January 2017 in a former coal mine with steel plant and was performed in Hellerau and Berlin in June and July 2017. The work reflects on phase transitions between solid, liquid and gaseous states of matter and is staged with live visuals by WARPED TYPE.

Materials
, 2016
for prepared piano, percussion, string ensemble and tape
Commissioned by Folkwang Kammerorchester Essen

I Slag and Coke
II Phase Transition 1
III Octenol
IV Phase Transition 2
V Iron

_____

World Premiere: 20 January 2017
Zeche Zollverein, Essen, Germany

Hauschka, prepared piano
Kai Angermann, percussion
WARPED TYPE - Andreas Huck, Roland Nebe, live visuals
Folkwang Kammerorchester Essen
Johannes Klumpp, conductor

Further dates:
15 June 2017, Festspielhaus Hellerau w/ MDR Symphony Orchestra

13 July 2017, Neue Meister concert series w/ Deutsches Kammerorchester Berlin
14 January 2018 w/ Szczecin Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra, Symphony Hall, Szczecin, Poland

ORCHESTRAL WORK

CASCADES

Composed by Volker Bertelmann
Commissioned by mdr, Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk





The fundamental, melancholic feeling of being in a state of floating, somewhere indefinable between loss and departure, was the subject of Hauschka's to date most comprehensive orchestra work "Cascades". Significantly, this triptych starts with the end. Loss, death, stand here at the beginning. The words "Nothing left. I lost everything." are spread by the choir in countless repetitions in a wide layer. For the middle part "From Ashes", the sound searcher Hauschka found an icily cold, crystal-clear string sound. The final movement "Perspective" for orchestra and choir is then anything but a celebratory symphonic finale. The music puts a question mark at the end of the optimistic words the text "Now, now future’s coming", the choir gets lost in unarticulated murmuring. "In this way 'perspective' is at the same time the start of loss", writes the composer. Beginning and end come together, another circle closes.

(Taken from a text on Hauschka’s orchestral work by music publicist Ilja Stephan, translation: Phil Cooksey)


CASCADES (2014, orchestral work in 3 movements)
World premiere: 20 January 2015, Gewandhaus Leipzig

1. Loss (for large mixed choir)
2. From Ashes (for large orchestra)
3. Perspective (for large orchestra and mixed choir)

Hauschka: piano
MDR Radio Choir
MDR Symphony Orchestra
Conductor: Kristjan Järvi