When Stockhausen Came To Huddersfield

Controversial German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen's visit to the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival nearly ended in disaster in 1988.

Ian McMillan finds out what happened.

The superstar of the Avant Garde, who featured on the front cover of the Beatles Sergeant Pepper album, had been shocking audiences since the 1950's with his dazzling compositions.

Stockhausen was lured to the quiet West Riding mill town for its 10th anniversary festival, because London's South Bank couldn't provide the rehearsal time and a suitable venue for his composition, Sternklang or 'Star Sound'. Festival Director Richard Steinitz had promised him the cavernous council owned sports hall for the performance, which was turned into an indoor park for the occasion, complete with Christmas trees and artificial turf.

While setting up for a concert in Huddersfield Town Hall, part of the ceiling fell onto Stockhausen's mixing desk and narrowly missed injuring the great man himself. During his visit Stockhausen developed a taste for the local curry house, bought earplugs to get to sleep in the railway hotel and invited local people to get ready for 'visitors from outer-space'. His reputation had gone before him, and he didn't disappoint those who were lucky enough to be there.

The visit put the festival on the map, and has become part of local folklore.

Ian talks to writer and broadcaster Robert Worby, the then Festival Director Richard Steinitz, Technical Manager Steve Taylor, musician Peter Britton who trained the student performers, and Jim Pywell who was a music student at the Polytechnic at the time.

Producer: Andrew Carter

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in November 2015.

The poet Ian McMillan on what really happened when Stockhausen came to Huddersfield.