Composer / Author: Martinu, Bohuslav
Title: Marionetten II
kleine Stücke für Klavier
Detailed instrumentation: Piano

This collection of fourteen pieces, together entitled Puppets, plays an exceptional role in the catalogue of early works by Bohuslav Martinu (1890-1959), namely in that itrepresents thefirst works by Martinu which transcended his initial attempts at compositionand quicklyfound a publisher. Thanks to their lasting popularity particularly with youngpianists, they were ultimately published in numerous editions. (The way the pieces arenumbered, whichthe composer verifiably accepted, however, does not correspond to their actualchronological order - they were, in fact, written in reverse order, so thatPuppets III camefirst, while Puppets I is the latest in the series.) All three books ofPuppets, which emergedbetween the years 1912 and 1925 and, despite their title, differ from oneanother in theiraesthetic approaches and progressive maturity, are published by EditioBärenreiter innew, revised urtext editions edited by Ales Brezina. This urtext edition with its relatively comprehensive preface describing the circumstances surrounding the advent ofthe work,is supported by the latest research and an assessment of all known and accessible sources, which the editor presents and clarifies in detail in his critical commentary to the second and third books of Puppets. The second book (Puppets II) is dated191 8and contains the following works: Puppet Theatre, Harlequin, Colombine Remembers,The Sick Puppet and Colombine Sings. Thanks to its witty musical ideas and the composer's empathy for children and their intellectual world, Puppets has,since its first edition, always been highly popular among performers.