20th century
Baroque
Classical
Romantic
20th century
21st century
Solo repertoire
Piccolo
Alto flute
Bass flute
Holliger Heinz
Aitken, Robert
Amirov, Fikret
Amlin, Martin
Amram, David
Andriessen, Jurriaan
Arnold, Malcolm
Arrieu, Claude
Auric, Georges
Babbit, Milton
Bacchus, Peter
Bacri, Nicolas
Baker, Michael Conway
Baksa, Robert
Barber, Samuel
Barrere, Georges
Bartók, Béla Viktor János
Baton, René-Emmanuel
Beaser, Robert
Bennet, Richard Rodney
Berg, Gunnar
Berio, Luciano
Bernofsky, Lauren
Bernstein, Leonard
Bloch, Ernest
Bolling, Claude
Bon, Maarten
Bonis, Mel
Boughton, Rutland
Boulanger, Marie-Juliette
Boulez, Pierre
Bourdin, Roger
Bournonville, Armand
Bowen, Edwin York
Bozza, Eugène Joseph
Bréville, Pierre
Brings, Allen
Brotons, Salvador
Brown, Elizabeth
Brun, Georges
Burkhard, Willy
Burton, Eldin
Büsser, Henri
Camus, Pierre
Carmichael, John
Carter, Elliott
Casella, Alfredo
Chaynes, Charles
Clarke, Ian
Colgrass, Michael
Colquhoun, Michael
Copland, Aaron
Corigliano, John
Cortese, Luigi
Currier, Sebastian
Dahl, Walter Ingolf Marcus
Damase, Jean-Michel
Davidovsky, Mario
De Lorenzo, Leonardo
Debussy, Claude
Del Tredici, David
DeLaney, Charles Oliver
Delerue, Georges
Denisov, Edison
Dèsbriere, Jacques
Dick, Robert
Dinicu, Grigoraș
Dodgson, Stephen
Dohnányi, Ernő
Dubois, Pierre Max
Dukas, Paul
Durey, Louis
Dutilleux, Henri
Enescu, George
Farkas, Ferenc
Feld, Jindřich
Ferroud, Pierre-Octave
Flothuis, Marius
Folio, Cynthia
Foote, Arthur
Foss, Lukas
Françaix, Jean
Fukushima, Kazuo
Gade, Jacob
Gál, Hans
Gaubert, Philippe
Genzmer, Harald
George, Thom Ritter
Ghidoni, Armando
Gieseking, Walter
Glass, Philip
Glière, Reinhold
Golovin, Andrei
Gordeli, Otar
Grier, Lita
Griffes, Charles Tomlinson
Grinblat, Romuald
Grovlez, Gabriel
Guarnieri, Mozart Camargo
Gubajdulina, Sofia
Hahn, Reynaldo
Hailstork, Adolphus
Halphen, Fernand
Hanson, Howard Harold
Harberg, Amanda
Harbison, John
Harsányi, Tibor
Harty, Hamilton
Heiss, John
Heith, David
Henze, Hans-Werner
Higdon, Jennifer
Hindemith, Paul
Holliger, Heinz
Holmboe, Vagn
Honegger, Arthur
Hoover, Katherine
Hosokawa, Toshio
Hovhaness, Alan
Hüe, Georges Adolphe
Hurel, Philippe
Ibert, Jacques
Ichiyanagi, Toshi
Ittzés, Gergely
Ives, Charles
Jacob, Gordon
James, Bob
Jemnitz, Sándor
Jirák, Karel Boleslav
Jóhannsson, Magnús Blöndal
Jolivet, André
Jongen, Joseph
Karg-Elert, Sigfrid
Kay, Ulysses
Kelterborn, Rudolf
Ķeniņš, Tālivaldis
Kennan, Kent Wheeler
Kennedy, Martin
Kernis, Aaron Jay
Khachaturian, Aram
Kocsár, Miklós
Kodaly, Zoltan
Koechlin, Charles
Kornauth, Egon
Kraft, Leo
Krzywicki, Jan
Kupferman, Meyer
La Montaine, John
Lauber, Joseph
Lavista, Mario
Lee, Eugene
Leeuwen, Ary van
Levinson, Gerald
Liebermann, Lowell
Loudova, Ivana
Mack, Dieter
Mahler, Gustav
Maresz, Yan
Martin, Frank
Martino, Donald
Martinů, Bohuslav
Meltzer, Harold
Messiaen, Olivier
Mihalovici, Marcel
Milhaud, Darius
Mouquet, Jules
Mower, Mike
Muczynski, Robert
Nielsen, Carl
Norby, Erik
Nordenstrom, Gladys
Offermans, Wil
Olsen, Carl Gustav Sparre
Paget, Daniel
Perle, George
Petrovics, Emil
Piazzolla, Astor
Piston, Walter
Poulenc, Francis
Prokofiev, Sergey
Rachmaninoff, Sergei
Ran, Shulamit
Raphael, Günter
Rautavaara, Einojuhani
Ravel, Maurice
Reynolds, Verne
Riegger, Wallingford
Rivier, Jean
Rodrigo, Joaquin
Rota, Nino
Rotaru, Doina
Rouse, Christopher
Roussel, Albert
Rutter, John
Saariaho, Kaija
Sancan, Pierre
Schmidt, Ole
Schocker, Gary
Schulhoff, Erwin
Schwantner, Joseph
Sciarrino, Salvatore
Shostakovich, Dmitri
Sibelius, Jean
Smit, Leo
Tailleferre, Germaine
Takemitsu, Tōru
Taktakishvili, Otar
Tansman, Alexandre
Tomasi, Henri
Tower, Joan
Uébayashi, Yuko
Varèse, Edgar
Vasks, Pēteris
Weigl, Vally
Weinberg, Mieczysław
Wilder, Alec
Williams, Ralph Vaughan
Yi, Chen
Yun, Isang
Zgraja, Krystof
(T)aire(e) for flute solo
(T)aire(e) for flute solo
Heinz Holliger: (T)aire(e) for flute solo was written between 1980 and 1983. It was premiered at the Festival Musica 1983 in Strasbourg, France, by Aurèle Nicolet, the legendary flutist to whom the work is dedicated.
The story of the title (T)aire(e) is a perfect example of Heinz Holliger’s obsession with musical semiotics. The title is a "nesting doll" of French meanings designed to be read and "played" simultaneously:
The primary verb inside the parentheses is taire, which means "to keep silent" or "to hush." In the early 1980s, Holliger was deeply influenced by Samuel Beckett, who famously struggled with the "obligation to express" when there was nothing to say.
The title tells the performer that the music is not "playing notes," but rather the sound of silence being broken. The brackets suggest that the "music" (the Aire) is being squeezed or suppressed by the act of "silencing" (Taire).
If you remove the "T," you are left with Aire. In French, this refers to a physical space: an aire de jeux (playground) or a threshing floor. It represents the "void" of the flute’s tube. Holliger wanted to deconstruct the traditional "Flute Air." By putting the "T" of Taire in front of it, he is literally "silencing the song."
When read as a whole, (T)aire(e) sounds like a feminine past participle (tairée), implying "that which has been silenced."
In 1983, Holliger was deeply immersed in the middle of his 15-year project, the Scardanelli-Zyklus (1975–1991). (T)aire(e) is a direct satellite of this cycle. It represents the "winter" of the poet Hölderlin’s mind: a state of frozen, fragmented speech.
Holliger Heinz
Heinz Holliger (1939) is a Swiss oboist and composer. His work is characterized by a relentless exploration of the physical limits of instruments and a deep fascination with literature and mental states.
Born in Langenthal, Switzerland, he grew up in a culturally rich environment. His father was a doctor and an amateur musician, providing an early foundation for his dual interests in the "physicality" of the human body and the art of sound.
He began playing the recorder at age six and the piano at age ten. However, it was his transition to the oboe at age eleven that defined his career. He studied at the Bern Conservatory while still a teenager, showing equal aptitude for performance and theory.
In the late 1950s, he moved to Paris to study oboe with Pierre Pierlot and piano with Yvonne Lefébure. More significantly, he studied composition with Pierre Boulez, a central figure of the musical avant-garde, who deeply influenced Holliger's rigorous approach to structure. Holliger is credited with expanding the technical vocabulary of the oboe more than any other 20th-century performer. He pioneered the use of multiphonics, glissandi, and circular breathing.
His compositions often push other instruments, such as the flute in (é)cri(t), to similar extremes. His style is frequently linked to "linguistic music," where musical gestures mimic the phonetics of speech or the "cries" of human emotion.
A significant portion of his output is inspired by "outsider" literary figures, most notably Samuel Beckett, Friedrich Hölderlin, and Robert Walser. His opera Schneewittchen (Snow White) is a prime example of his dark, psychological aesthetic.