South African Suite for chamber orchestra (op. 13a, 1956)
I. Ali Baba, II. Kalahari, III. Burentanz, IV. Basuto Elegie V. Heia Safari
Chamber orchestra (1.1.1.1 - 1.1.0.0 - percussion, harp, strings)
Percussion instrumentation: vibraphone, xylophone, snare drum, bass drum, military drum, cymbals (bass and snare), bongos, temple blocks, triangle, small wooden drum, gong, guiro, timpani
Duration: 18 minutes
Title: III Burentanz - Length: 28 pages - Date: 10 Feb. 56 - Location:
I. Ali Baba, II. Kalahari, IV. Basuto Elegy, V. Heia Safari are lost
Ricordi Berlin MOD 386 / score and parts
A ‘South African Suite in 5 Movements’(composed for the Stech Ensemble) by Bertold Hummel from Freiburg immediately demonstrated a fusion of traditional Cantus-firmus technique – which we have just cited as a structural device – with the use of the most sophisticated instrumental techniques, a combination of shifting timbres with a pointed musical language, which was particularly evident in the predominantly asymmetrical rhythms. Hummel wrote his music in South Africa, as a kind of on-site environmental study, so to speak, drawing on old Boer folk songs.
Behr, Wolfgang Martin: The small entertainment orchestra of the Südwestfunk under the direction of Willi Stech. Studies on the task and significance of a radio orchestra (1992). Printed: Baden-Baden 1994 (= Südwestfunk, Schriftenreihe Rundfunkgeschichte, Vol. 3).
I was in South Africa in 1954/55 and the artistic situation in Namibia was very different from that in the Union of South Africa. While there were concerts and artistic activities in Cape Town and Johannesburg, for example, that could be compared with those in Europe, Namibia, as well as other smaller places in the Union of South Africa, was a purely musical developing country at the time. The political situation of apartheid was incomprehensible to me and has, thank God, been overcome today. At that time, I wrote the South African Suite - a kind of musical travel diary - with the movement titles: Ali Baba, Kalahari, Burentanz, Basuto-Elegie and Heia Safari, which Willi Stech recorded with the Small Orchestra of the Südwestfunk Baden-Baden after my return to Germany.
Bertold Hummel (in: "Conversation with Bertold Hummel" January 1998, Tutzing 1998)