Der Blinde (The Blind Man) is the twenty-sixth in a series of short works for solo instrument based upon characters from Der Ohrenzeuge: Fünfzig Charaktere (Earwitness: Fifty Characters), written in 1974 by the Bulgarian-born British-Austrian novelist Elias Canetti (1905-1994). Canetti’s distinctive studies incorporate poetic imagery, singular insights, and unabashed wordplay to create fifty ironic paradigms of human behavior. This collection, begun in 1997, was inspired by the vividly surreal depictions of Canetti’s characters, and comprises twenty-four solo works to date—composed for familiar instruments such as violin, guitar, piano, and trombone, as well as less common instruments such as ocarina, cimbalom, glass harmonica, and carillon. works for contrabass, violin, bass flute, ocarina, contrabassoon, glass harmonica, alto saxophone, trumpet, percussion, bass saxophone, guitar, piccolo, organ, basset horn, and violoncello, among others. In Canetti’s depiction of this character, the blind man “has a camera, he takes it everywhere, and he just loves keeping his eyes closed…. He travels all over the world for the sake of his camera… [and] does not believe anything that was not shot… if he could not point at it he would not know where he had been, the world is confusing, exotic, and rich, who can retain it all?”

Der Blinde was composed in July-August of 2026 for pianist Eunmi Ko.