Wailing Wall

Arne Nordheim was very interested in the Wailing Wall, which he visited in 1990 and 1996. On his first visit, he heard singing and a confusion of voices coming from the left side of the wall. It seemed to him that he could recognise his own music; he had never previously heard that humming or muttering, which turned out to be coming from a house of prayer – a secret temple in a big grotto at the end of a long corridor. Everyone was reciting or singing there by themselves. Nordheim thought that the aural impression of that mixture of song and recitation was almost the same as in his Aurora. (jc)