This performance will feature a live score performed by Hugo Max.

"I first saw Murnau’s Symphony of Horror when I was nine years old. The film’s expressionistic images continue to haunt me, the chiaroscuro compositions tapping vividly into timeless subconscious fears.

My improvisations on viola and piano draw inspiration from the leitmotifs and sound effects of 70s horror soundtracks and the languages of Second Viennese School composers contemporary to Murnau, also Jewish Traditional Music that informs my personal approach to creating a score for the film." - Hugo Max

Please view this YouTube video for a sample of Hugo's work.


Photo Credit - Richard Ecclestone

An iconic film of the German expressionist cinema, and one of the most famous of all silent movies, F. W. Murnau's Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror continues to haunt — and, indeed, terrify — modern audiences with the unshakable power of its images. By teasing a host of occult atmospherics out of dilapidated set-pieces and innocuous real-world locations alike, Murnau captured on celluloid the deeply-rooted elements of a waking nightmare, and launched the signature "Murnau-style" that would change cinema history forever.

In this first-ever screen adaptation of Bram Stoker's Dracula, a simple real-estate transaction leads an intrepid businessman deep into the superstitious heart of Transylvania. There he encounters the otherworldly Count Orlok — portrayed by the legendary Max Schreck, in a performance the very backstory of which has spawned its own mythology — who soon after embarks upon a cross-continental voyage to take up residence in a distant new land... and establish his ambiguous dominion. As to whether the count's campaign against the plague-wracked populace erupts from satanic decree, erotic compulsion, or the simple impulse of survival — that remains, perhaps, the greatest mystery of all in this film that's like a blackout...

This performance will feature a live score performed by Hugo Max

Benjamin Christensen’s Häxan must to be seen to be believed. Playing out as a lecture on witchcraft ‘made flesh’, the film foreshadows the found footage horror genre and features many of the most imaginatively realised and grotesque visuals of silent cinema history. My viola takes on the voice of the occult-obsessed lecturer(/director), possessed by the alluring darkness of the subject, wrestling with the film’s message of hierarchal corruption and its prevailing controversies.

"My improvisations on viola and piano draw inspiration from the leitmotifs and sound effects of 70s horror soundtracks and the languages of Second Viennese School composers contemporary to Murnau, also Jewish Traditional Music that informs my personal approach to creating a score for the film." - Hugo Max

Please view this YouTube video for a sample of Hugo's work.

F. W. Murnau’s 1926 reimagining of the Faustian legend narratively draws upon the dramas of Goethe and Marlowe while blazing with a singular visual power. Epic in scale and breathtakingly fantastical, Faust is propelled by tragic urgency and romance. An ode to the triumphant power of love, this film explores themes that permeate and unite Murnau’s oeuvre. My viola soundtrack combines the expressionistic gestures of central European music from the 1920s with references to the treasure trove of Faust-inspired compositions.

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Max Plays Murnau – UK Tour 2025

Join Hugo Max as he accompanies a daring triptych of films by F. W. Murnau (1888-1931) this spring with live soundtracks on solo viola.

Following the success of his 2024 UK Tour, Max improvises scores to Murnau’s classic Nosferatu (1922), chamber drama The Last Laugh (1924) and epic Faust (1926) at cinemas across the UK. His vivid performances breathe new life into Murnau’s expressionistic imagery.

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A film from the holdings of the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung (www.murnau-stiftung.de) in Wiesbaden.