INSTRUMENTATION: 3,0,3,0 – 4,3,3,1 – 4 perc, strings
DURATION: 10:00
YEAR OF COMPOSITION: 2014
PREMIERE: September 19th, 2014 at Ultima Festiaval by Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Ilan Volkov. November 26th, by Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra at Göteborgs konserthus. Also performed by WDR Orchester Köln on January 29th 2016
COMMISSION: Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra / Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra
ABOUT: During a few days in March 2014 I visited my hometown Göteborg, a city I moved away from a long time ago. I wanted to stroll around in the town on a sound walk – just to listen to the city´s current atmosphere and character without any visual impact. I made field recordings at noisy Valand, crowded with tramways, and at Brunnsparken with an ongoing messy counterpoint of people, birds and traffic announcements. I took a ride with the harbour ferry Älvsnabben, and was absorbed by sound of the roaring brake engines in relief to the cool ripples of the sea. I walked to Domkyrkan where foot steps in the gravel merged with the slow glissandi of the tramways.
The city lifestyle and sound environment has been a great source of inspiration for my compositions the past years. Each city has its own specific sound character that its inhabitants are creating continuously through their daily life. The music has become a sort of diary that portraits the city where I am currently living, and is a way of honouring the sounds that accompanies our everyday life. From a documentary angle interesting and unexpected timings among city activities can sometimes occur, but my aim was to transform the material into a semi fictional world, a “staged” version of the original urban moment, where parameters such as timing, dynamic and timbre have developed new dramatic significances with purposeful interactions.
PUBLISHER: Swedish Music Information Centre