Paul Dessau composed more than 450 works from all the genres, but scarcely a single one of them continues to meet with recognition and representation in today's concert world. The musicians of the Ensemble Avantgarde decided to change this with an impressive overview of the chamber oeuvre of this composer. The young Dessau celebrated great successes with his Concertino in the unusual instrumentation for solo violin with flute, clarinet, and horn already in 1925 and even won a composition prize for it. Dessau himself actually wanted to become a violinist, and Gewandhaus concertmaster Andreas Seidel masters with bravura what at times is a wildly virtuosic solo part. The young composer’s very own combination of the linear style of a Hindemith and the expressive and complex harmony of the early Schönberg is the hallmark of his individual musical language. The Ensemble Avantgarde has established a successful career with this era of music; previous recordings on MDG include the works of Scelsi, Lampersberg and Stravinsky.