About The Music

Bettina Hartl, musician and composer, is inspired by two main currents of our music history. First, she is dedicated to a very special part of our occidental music period, early Italian baroque. Here she heard optimism, expressed with reality and authenticity in an extraordinary complexity of uncountable modulations, balanced voices and unstrained virtuosity, coupled with in this form, for the first time occurring dissonances. Later she found her way to Sufi music, to the eternal laws of the cosmos, reflected in the orbits of stars and planets, the rhythms of nature, the breathing in and out of music, the complexity of modulations as well as the stillness of a single tone; an all-in-one experience.

In her search for these two cultural foundations Hartl explores connections and contrasts, which allow conjecture over their similar roots. She merges her own baroque music with new arrangements of one Claudio Monteverdi, contra posed with Indian and Persian Sufi music, reworking her compositions and also introducing elements of Celtic music.

With compositions boasting a diversity of forms and styles, Hartl has written love songs, baroque Ciacconas, music reminding us of shamans and film music. She always allows space for improvisation, combining rigorous format with experiment. Alongside classical instrumentation she introduces unusual instruments which are seldom heard together. To fit with the energy of the composition Bettina Hartl also uses different languages and fantasy verse.