...an excerpt from a booklet from one of our publications... 0022

Hans Werner Henze, the guitar and the Royal Winter Music • 1.Hans Werner Henze and the guitar In 1955 Henze then moved from Ischia to Naples where he could fully enjoy those cultural influences - Greek, Arab, Spanish, but also German and Italian - so dear to him and still present in the Neapolitan microcosm. Hans Werner Henze’s interest in the guitar and similar instruments dates back to the 1950s. In his first opera Boulevard Solitude of 1951 a mandolin appears in the score and, later, he would also use the guitar for the first time in the radio opera Das Ende einer Welt, in 1953, a period in which the composer already resides in Italy. 2 In the streets of Naples the music was present day and night and Henze, walking, knows and is fascinated by the talent of a young eighteen year old guitarist, singer and actor Fausto Cigliano. Henze thus invites Cigliano to record the 48 short pieces written for the radio drama Der sechste Gesang, by Ernst Schnabel, a story on the theme of “Ulysses”, for the German radio station of Baden-Baden. The popular singersongwriter, however, not knowing the musical notation, jeopardized the realization of the entire project, so Henze decided to entrust the recording to an expert guitarist in contemporary repertoire, Anton Stingl. Anyway the composer did not fail to thank and publicly praise the young Neapolitan guitarist during a reportage for the Stuttgart radio station, during which he consecrated him among the stars of Neapolitan