COMMENTS TO PIECES
------Pieces in cronological order-----
Untitled #1 -For cl, -altering bass cl, 2 vls, vla vlc, pf. 2003/rev 2009.
This piece was written during the winter in 2002-2003 on a comission by the Swed-American ensemble Acidophilus Live culture.
The piece was a part of a cooperation with the video artist Pernilla Edholm and a version of the piece with video accompaniying the music was first performed at Scandinavia House in New York. The project was called Shovel, refering to all the shovelling that the two partners had been doing mentally the last years on seperate fronts. It was also a sad time in the aftermaths of 9/11 when the USA just hade started it´s warfare in Afghanistan and accurately was planning their invasion of Iraq.
As I composer I had recently managed, or much thank´s to this project, I did manage to get out of a two year long period of musical inability. This is reflected in the music by the "white caracter" which was a memory from the time when it was all like "blank in my head". I therefore named the separate version without video, Untitled #1.-For the Burnt Out.
A small revision was made in 2009.
Krister Hansén -August 2009
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Why are wild boars wild? -For Mixed chamber orchestra -2009.
Arne Bjørhei, trumpet player and pedagogue at the conservatory in Tromsø asked me if I wanted to write a piece for the Young musicians gathering in Tromsø. The piece will be played by young folks from Norway and Russia together with students from the conservatory. It´s a rather short and moderate piece combining sound from Rock drums and cembalo togheter with strings wind and piano. Follow this link to see the score in sibelius format. Remember that you need the Scorch plug in.
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Off-Road -For Violin duo 2009
Sometimes, when you feel that the roads you travel, are to predictable, and that you have been riding this road to many times, you start looking for a way to go somewhere else. Musical roads are a combination of musical preferences and everything from fear for the unknown to a crazy experiance of loosing yourself for something bigger. That´s something worth longing for and something I tried to achieve in this piece.
Krister Hansén, January 2010
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Morgengruss -For soprano and Wind orchestra, 2009
Schubert wrote this song in his Song cycle Die Shöne mullerin. I found this simple but beautiful melody very interesting since in the text a small drama develops in the head of the main character. A boy who at a distance admires a girl. He wants her to see him and the song is a about this Hallo in the morning. It ´s lika a psycho drama in the head of this man. I changed the voice to soprano because I wanted to write a piece on the piece for wind orchestra and voice, and it fits better that way. I also thought that I could be nice to think of this as love between to women, since that in a higher degree is a subject of developing psycho dramas.
Krister Hansén, October 2009
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Rhyme or resistance? -For singers, 2009
Rhyme or resistance? is a melody written for singers who may perform it anywhere in any occasion. It is built on another melody by Louis Andriessen which I recomposed and made much better if I may say it myself. The singers are moving with eyes shut using their voice as a way to avoid colliding with each other, they use one tone each from the melody. They can put whatever word they want to the tone and they can also sing the complete tune. They can improvise to this tune and this process can last as long as the process is creative.
The piece was first performed in Tromsø on the 13 of march (friday) at he Kontak-festival.
Krister Hansén, March 2009
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Semplice 2, -Violin duo, 2009
I first met duo Gelland in 2001 as a student at the Department for music and media in Piteå. At the time I had serious problems to write music. It was like blank in my head. It really made me frustrated. We were going to write a piece for them but I couldn´t get started. One day I just sat down and wrote the simpliest thing I could do. The piece had almost no rythm, or melody, not even dynamics. But the result was astonishing good. Just because the musicians are so good and so able to make the most of it.
I wrote this piece on 2001 01 02. Lot of zeroes and 1 and 2!
When I measured the duration of the piece, it showed that the piece lasted for exactly 2 min. and 1 second or 2´ 01" to use a more convincing way of putting it. Coincidence? Or maybe God had something to do with it. As a matter of fact; to my surprise, the Gellands made a first performance i Piteå a couple of days later, Where? In the Church of course.
This winter I continued to write on the Semplice series and finished Semplice 2, pretty exactly 8 years later, and I also finished it on one day. If I continue in this pace I will be able to make another 3 Semplice pieces until I retire at 67 ( which I never will of course ), but anyway. This must be a very slow way of writing music, but it is also a way.
The piece was first performed in Duluth, Minnesota on the 7 april 2009.
Krister Hansén, March 2009
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Flux´s & Fishes, -Trio for Sax, Cl, Pf, 2008
I have spent hours in a pool, trying to learn to swim like a fish. I have tried to find the balance and to minimize the water resistance.
It sometimes occur that you get into a feeling of flow. It is seldom and you always strive after that feeling. You have to be relaxed and focused. In this piece I try to catch the feeling of being in flow. It is something you often have to work hard to get into, and sometimes you get into fierce struggling in trying to get that feeling. But all of a sudden it is there, and you experience a feeling of happiness when everything is flowing and you just glide. It is almost a transcendental experience. Hopefully the listener can experience something like that in my piece.
The piece was first performed by Trio Alma at Mari Helene Bjørnstads graduation concerto at the masters program, on the 21 feb. 2009.
It was dedicated to Trio Alma.
Arnemark, 15 Februari 2009.
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Triple Falling, -Trombone Concerto, Trombone, String Orchestra, 2008
Why is anything important at all? Why try to change anything or do anything, if we concider the fact that averything will all fade away? Our memories will die with us, and mother earth will burn when the sun turns to a super nova. Everything will go to hell anyway. My piece in three parts is a way of putting it but from three different perspectives. Love, Ambitions, and Relations.
The piece was written to the Arctic trombone and Lowbrass festival and the trombone soloist Jörgen van Rijen who will perform it in October 2008 together with Tromsø symfoniorkester.
The parts are called; -In Love, -for Mr Polonium, -Into Oblivion.
Arnemark, July 2008
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Trans-Neptunian Spatial, Quartet, Soprano Sax, Violin, Accordion, Piano -2005/2008
Space has always caught my imagination. The thought of other different planets in our solar system where other physical laws rules circumstanses is very thrilling to me. My music and my way of listening is for me natural in the same way that it is natural to breathe oxygen and drink water if you live on the planet earth. But the rules that govern my music are probably not the same rules as in other composers music. In fact; I often get the feeling that my music has a certain outlandish or strange behavior compared to tradition, so therefore I call this piece Trans-Neptunian Spatial, which is a place beyond the space of Neptune.
The piece was written in 2005 but revised in 2008. It has never been performed.
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Luciano, Concerto for Violin and Chamber orchestra -2008
This piece is written to partiticpate in the 4th Edition of Musica e Arte Composition Contest. It caught my immediate interest because of the reference to the theme by Luciano Berio, which in turn had references to Bela Bartok. Two composers with a great interest for tradition even though they were modernists. This idea that one is standing with one foot in tradition and the other in the future or in visions or dreams is a good and inspiring starting point for me. I have used this excerpt as a free but inspiring starting point and I have tried to draw some conclusions from the theme and have used it to build form.
The interesting challenge was to create music which sounded very much like my music even though the theme was borrowed. To my own joy I really think that I managed in that sense.
The piece was awarded first prize in the competition.
Arnemark/Tromsö in Januar/April 2008
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Powerty, wind quintet- 2007
Many years ago I heard a piece by Gavin Bryars which at the time made an impression on me. It was the piece "Jesus´ blood"...
The piece consist of a recording of an old man who sings a choral: "Jesus´ blood never failed me yet, never failed me yet." In the background there is a string ensemble playing an ostinato over and over again. The piece is long, especially when you think about the fact that the ostinato that is repeated over and over again is so short.
My piece is not long, neither does it use the same ostinato technique. It´s only like a memory where I try to remember a feeling that I had when I first heard the piece 15 years ago.
A part of this feeling is captured in a short cadenza which is repeated and altered through the 6 min long piece.
Tromsö in december 2007
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Sinfonia 1, -2007
Intensive, perfect timing with it roots in classical craftsmanship. The first symphony is written for our present time where orchestras are used in a more pragmatic way and possibly a more traditional manner. This is a classical drama!
The symphony orchestra has endless possibilities. My first symphony shows that there are undiscovered paths and secrets to be exposed with the help of the symphony orchestra as a tool.
The music is made up of a single piece dived into four parts. The idea goes towards a more three piece “sinfonia” rather than a single symphony. The prologue leads the way for the unnoticeable increase in the following 3 pieces. Its roll is to create a mood which returns later in the piece. In the final three pieces there occurs a gradual increase of intensity. At times the music can be so intense that the listener needs a short break in order to catch their breath.
A bit into the symphony the music starts to level itself out and the contours can be identified easier. The obscurities in the music become eventually clearer and clearer. In the final piece the music has sharp and distinctive contours.
This is music inspired of real sounds for example: thuds of a blacksmith’s hammer, a storm that thrashes against the ocean and chatty magpies. Everything is transformed into to resounding orchestra music. Trapped movable energy which challenges and influences everything and intensive right into the symphony’s final beat.
Arnemark, may 2007
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The Idiot, -2007
The are many "The idiot" in the cultural sphere. Originally the word idiot was a name for a person in ancient Grecce who not had any interest in contributing in the society. I.E taking part in politics or debates. A person who was him self enough. If we use that term today we can see that in our society there are many idiots. Or maybe the interest has moved from the politics were decisions are being made to the blogg sphere were every one can have his own opinion? In that case the world is really filled with idiots. And I´m one of them. My piece reflects this attitude of digging into ones belly button really seriuosly to see what one might find.
The piece was composed to Norrbotten NEO in the beginning of 2007.
Krister Hansén -Tromsö 2008