“Besides music, it was always writing that fascinated me. I wanted to find my own language, closely linked to the music and its flow, to express feelings in this way. If I had had the talent to draw, I probably would have tried it.
Writing means to me to tell a story from my soul much more creatively than I can reproduce in the language of the music that others have created.”
Martin’s Books
New book “Women: Love – Life”
“Women: Love – Life” is the title Martin Sieghart gives to his collection of short stories. The title reveals its origins in music—classical music.
Three women: A farmer’s wife, living the typically harsh life of a small village, who breaks free to experience happiness and love just once—before everything collapses around her, leaving a burning question unanswered.
A woman whose exceptional intelligence prevents her from connecting with people and loving unconditionally—until she meets a man who “wants nothing from her except to give her everything.”
He stays by her side until her early death.
And a baroness, whose life is told in retrospect. The tragedies of a great, famous family after the world wars, the inability to accept the new world—one that feels foreign and seemingly inferior. At the same time, the present of the old lady: her final years spent with her beloved “maid.”
Transitions
Martin Sieghart bridged the Covid-induced period of inactivity by writing a book “Transitions,” a Musician’s Experience in 50 Chapters.
Transitions from biographical tales to those inhabiting a fictional dream realm.
Inspired by a visit to a Grinzing “Heurigen,” where an exceptionally talented young man sang and played music, he invents a fledgling pianist from Transylvania who is forced by circumstance to relinquish his promising career and eventually comes to Vienna, where he succeeds in making a solid living by becoming a Heurigen musician performing in the various languages of his German/Hungarian/Romanian heritage before ultimately seeing a concert grand piano that was brought to his venue for a reception …
A TV sleuth, long weary of his profession, has to endure Mozart’s Requiem during a shoot of his series in the small country church of “Leidenstein.”
His initial total aversion towards this idea gradually becomes a deep and existential experience that ultimately leads to his redemption.
Memories of his life in 1960s Vienna, of playing the organ in Upper Austria, of his great mentor Josef Mertin, of his years as a member of the Vienna Symphony, his time as chief conductor in Stuttgart, Linz, and Arnhem, about wonderful and less wonderful encounters with great artists.
Of his opera festival at Reinsberg, of Strauss concert tours to Japan, and of benefit performances.
Of an evening drinking beer with Anton Bruckner and his Adagio from his 6th Symphony, of the Bohemian Forest, and much more.
Hollitzer published the book in the autumn of 2021.