MUSIC OUTSIDE THE BOX

Henriette Müller has been developing a unique musical style of her own, beyond categories such as “classical”, “world”, “new music” or “jazz”.

As in her art, she is guided by a sense of inner freedom in her compositions.

Blues scales may meet twelve tone material. To listeners, the line between notated and improvised music is often blurred. Musicologist Hartmuth Fladt called it “the union of apparent opposites”.

In Europe, Henriette Müller performed her compositions with John Tchicai (Århus International Jazz Festival 1991), drummer Ed Ware (1994) and in different trios with Ray Kaczynski, Bill Elgart, Carlos Bica. She played with Czech guitarist/singer Dagmar Andrtovà at St. Rochus Church in Prague in 1997 and 1998 and with Johannes Bockholt and Simon Pauli from 1999 to 2006.

In New York, she played her music in clubs like the Five Spot and the Knitting Factory (with Jeff Brillinger, Peter Herbert, Ben Allison, Rez Abassi and others).

In May 1996, her work was featured in the World Beat Series at the Guggenheim Museum in four concerts with Jim Black and Tony Scherr during the show “Abstraction in the 20th Century”.

Photo: Private

All of the compositions are available through the composer unless noted otherwise. Henriette Müller would like to keep track of performances of her music (to follow up on royalties from the copyright society GEMA). Please contact her therefore for any sheet music you are interested in.

Her music can also be borrowed at the Archiv Frau und Musik (archive of compositions by women) in Frankfurt/Main.

Selected chamber music:

Fantasie Nr. 1 für Flöte
Length: 5’50

Original version for solo flute premiered November 2002 in Berlin by Ulrike Philippi

Premiere of version for solo violoncello by Marika Gejrot on 15 February 2004 at Martha-Kirche in Berlin

Arrangement for clarinet with electronics performed by Claudio Puntin in 2017, published on bandcamp in 2025

Two Episodes for Mixed Wind Quartet
Length: 6’56

Saxophone quartet or mixed wind quartet (soprano saxophone, flügelhorn, trombone, baritone saxophone)
Premiered at Manhattan School of Music, New York, in 1994

Allegria Ma Non Senza Tristezza
Length: 5’50

Saxophone quartet
Version for soprano saxophone, bass and percussion (length 8’02)
recorded on Silberne Lachtränen (BOS.REC.209-01), released May 2002

Canto Alegre
Length: 4’32

Sextett for flute, oboe, clarinette, French horn, bassoon and piano
Commissioned and premiered by “Canzonetta” in 1999

Snake Dance
Length: 6’30

For soprano saxophone and bass, published by F. Noetzel Verlag
ISMN M-2019-7493

Trio version for soprano saxophone, electric bass and percussion (length 5’53) recorded on “Snake Dance”, Konnex Records KCD 5130, released 2004

Three Dances for Soprano Saxophone and Bass
Length: 6’05

Published by F. Noetzel Verlag
ISMN M-2019-7491

Premiered by Henriette Müller and Simon Pauli in 2002
Recording of live performance by Claudio Puntin and Felix Henkelhausen 2017, online release on Bandcamp in 2025

Meer-Frieden
Length: 4’50

Saxophone quartet

Version for soprano saxophone, bass and percussion (length: 5’15) recorded on Silberne Lachtränen (BOS.REC.209-01), released May 2002

Version for soprano saxophone and bass published by F. Noetzel Verlag
ISMN M-2019-7492

Explorations
Length: 8’54

For soprano saxophone and violoncello or for two violins

Premiere of the version for soprano saxophone and violoncello on February 15, 2004 at Martha-Kirche in Berlin by Marika Gejrot and Henriette Müller.

Recorded on “Snake Dance”, Konnex Records KCD 5130, released 2004

Two Shades of Blue
Length: 11’15

For soprano saxophone, violoncello, bass and percussion or for saxophone and bass

Premiered November 9, 2003, at Kirche zur Heimat, Berlin
Recorded on “Snake Dance”, Konnex Records KCD 5130, released 2004

Musicology professor Hartmuth Fladt in the liner notes of “Snake Dance”:

“Two Shades of Blue (11) brings all 4 musicians together once again. Here, Henriette Müller has arrived at her very own, unmistakable musical idiom that embodies a union of apparent opposites in superior style.

The “shades” refer to the colour BLUE with all its connotations, but also to the good old blues (represented with two scales). In the depths of this BLUE we find twelve-tone as well as modal and symmetrically modal material, rhythmic complexity as well as rhythmic simplicity, and the colourful as well as the monochrome from all the cultures that the composer has come to know.”

Leben, Frage
Length: 7’14

Instrumental version for soprano saxophone, violoncello, electric bass and percussion (see “Music for choirs” for original version)

Recorded on “Snake Dance”, Konnex Records KCD 5130, released 2004

Hartmuth Fladt in the liner notes of “Snake Dance”:

“No. 6 Leben, Frage (“Life, Question”)…,[is]based in essence on Modus III by Olivier Messiaen, a scale with symmetrical octave division.

The composer herself described the choir version of “Leben, Frage” as “using this modus in effect as raga rubato, combining it with choir passages spoken and sung in asymmetrical meters, which time and again assume the function of an (Indian?) rhythm section.”

The (dialectical) search for meaning, for possible or impossible continuity, and the distillation of für sich (per se) leading to the question of meaning in Leben zum Tod (life to death) – all of this can be sensed in the instrumental version as well.”

Music is Not a Luxury
In Memoriam Audre Lorde

Length: 6’20

For saxophone, bass and percussion

Premiered 6 December 2002 at Planetarium am Insulaner in Berlin, at a commemoration of Audre Lorde (1934-1992) ten years after her death
Recorded on “Snake Dance”, Konnex Records KCD 5130 (2004)

Left: Audre Lorde, photo: Robert Alexander

The title refers to Audre Lorde’s famous essay “Poetry is not a luxury”:

“For women, then, poetry is not a luxury. It is vital necessity of our existence. It form the quality of the light within which we predicate our hopes and dreams toward survival and change.” (“Sister Outsider”, New York 1984, page 37)

Vocal chamber music:

Oma
Length: 4’40

Elegy for mezzosoprano and piano.
Text by Henriette Müller in German.
Premiered at Manhattan School of Music in New York in 1994

Omnis Terra
Length: 13’08

For mezzosoprano, soprano saxophone and organ
Text from psalm 100 in English and Latin

Commissioned by Evangelische Kirche Berlin, premiered 28 April 1999 by Stefan Schuck, Tina Hörhold and Henriette Müller at Kirche am Hohenzollernplatz, Berlin

Music for choir:

Im Antlitz des Todes
Length: 9’30

For mixed choir a capella in eight voices
Text by May Ayim in German

Published by
Florian Noetzel Verlag »Ars Musica«, ISMN M-2019-7494-1

The Language of Past Seasons
Length: 11’55

For mixed choir in 8 voices, soprano saxophone, bass and drums
Text by Audre Lorde

Commissioned by Tübinger Kammerchor under the direction of Gerhard Steiff
Premiered by Tübinger Kammerchor and Henriette Müller on 21 February 1998
Further performances by Hanns-Eisler-Chor with the composer in Berlin 2000

Recorded on 25 March 2000 at Passionskirche Berlin and released on the album “SurprEisler 2” in 2000. For more information visit the Website of Hanns-Eisler-Chor.

Leben, Frage
Length: 11’09

For mixed choir in 4 voices, soprano saxophone, double bass and percussion
Text by Robert Schindel in German

Premiere 29 November 2003 by Hanns-Eisler-Chor Berlin at the Berlin Philharmonic

Find your peace of mind
Length: 8′

For mixed choir a capella in four voices
Can also be performed with piano, bass and drums
Text by Henriette Müller

The echoes of my sorrows
Length: 12′

For mixed choir in 8 voices, soprano saxophone, bass and drums
Text by Henriette Müller (2022)

Music for large jazz orchestra/bigband:

Back Home Where It’s Quiet
Length: 10′

For large jazz orchestra
Recorded by Henriette Müller on the album Memories of a Swan Song (Konnex KCD 5072 1996) in the version for jazz quartet

Sweet Seconds
Length: 4’40

For large jazz orchestra
Published by BIT-Musikverlag, Berlin
Recorded by JayJayBeCe Bigband on the album How Rook, (BIT 11185 1999)

Also featured on Henriette Müller’s album Memories of a Swan Song (Konnex KCD 5072 1996) in a version for saxophone and drums

Please contact the composer for lead sheets if your would like to perform any of her jazz compositions for small ensembles.