Matthias Krüger
Where Musical Ideas Begin and End

In his compositions, Matthias Krüger interweaves references from classical music and pop culture, from philosophy and tradition, to create a unique sound experience. His music is performed on stages and festivals around the world.

By Romy König

Composer Matthias Krüger’ music is performed on stages and festivals around the world. | Photo (detail): © Hauser / Matthias Krüger A night of clubbing in Istanbul, art practices of the Māori people in New Zealand, fantasy literature – anyone who embraces the works of the composer Matthias Krüger will inevitably be brought into contact with all kinds of different influences. “With Matthias Krüger, anything can turn out to be the beginning or end of a musical idea,” writes the musicologist Bastian Zimmermann.

Inspired by Encounters

In his musical work, Matthias Krüger is interested in tensions: what happens when the abstract magic of sonic structures coincides with a person’s body, yearnings and obsessions? What role in this is played by the musician, who after all is also just a person with their own individual uncertainties and limits, a person who is searching for identity and redemption? As Krüger explains, he is always preoccupied with the question of whether it is “desirable and constructive” for the musician to work their way so relentlessly through these topics; whether music “really always has to sweat”.

Born in Ulm in 1987, Matthias Krüger studied music composition and French in Cologne, was a visiting scholarship holder at the Sorbonne in Paris and at Columbia University in New York City, and was taught by Johannes Schöllhorn, Krzystof Meyer and Fabien Lévy, among others. He draws inspiration from personal encounters, master classes with other composers and international festivals such as the impuls Academie Graz or the composers’ meeting in Görlitz/Zgorzelec.

A Network of References

Sketch sheet from “Bellygoat Boom”, composition for orchestra. | Photo (detail): © Matthias Krüger Krüger’s compositions are characterized by a high degree of artistic association: he interweaves references from within and outside music to build a network of them, be they from classical music, pop culture or philosophy. His music is played by numerous radio stations, as well as at national and international festivals and concert halls, including the Konzerthaus Berlin, the Palau de la Música Catalana in Barcelona, the Centre Pompidou in Paris and Carnegie Hall in New York, not to mention at the Tzlil Meudcan Festival Tel Aviv and Shanghai New Music Week. He is always open to new versions of his work: when the ensemble consord performed and went on tour with a reinterpretation of Le Vide à Perdre, a piece of music that was composed in 2016 and recorded in 2019, he enjoyed hearing his own work being played “in different moods, rooms and acoustics”.

In the autumn of 2023, the multiple award-winning artist who currently lives in Paris and Cologne will be beginning a Goethe-Institut residency in Montreal; this will be followed in 2024 by a three-month stay at the German Center for Venetian Studies in Venice. It probably won’t be long before his listeners start to hear some of his impressions from Montreal and Venice reflected in his music – marking the end of a musical thought.

Or its beginning.