Once again renowned pianist Steffen Schleiermacher sets out in quest of clues and discovers completely new sides to the eccentric Scelsi who turned his life story into a quiz show and turned his nose up at compositional convention. Into the 1950s piano music occupied the focus in Scelsi's oeuvre, and he deliberately withdrew from the avant-garde mainstream of his times. Steffen Schleiermacher has selected two suites that could hardly be more different, though both have enigmatic titles referring to Far Eastern cultures. "BotBa," the subtitle of Suite No. 8, mentions Tibetan dances and religious rituals. Things are very different in Suite No. 9, "Ttai"; Scelsi wrote of this meditative music: "Excited persons would do well to abstain." He expressly refers to the "Sound of the sacred OM" said to favour meditative and transcendental experiences. Relations between tonal centres play an important role in both suites.
