Matthias Krüger
Where Musical Ideas Begin and End
![Screenshot from the concert film featuring Matthias Krüger’s “sweep over me them dusty bristles”. Screenshot from the concert film featuring Matthias Krüger’s “sweep over me them dusty bristles” with video artist Rikisaburo Sato, choreographer Eddie Martinez and the ensemble Inverspace.](/resources/files/jpg1267/screenshot-aus-dem-konzertfilm-zu-matthias-kruegers-sweep-over-me-them-dusty-bristles-formatkey-jpg-w320m.jpg)
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
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
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.