See-through
Dutch Radio Philharmonic Orchestra, cond. Micha Hamel
1:00 min. excerpt
See-through
description
See-through is a work with two faces: a direct, theatrical façade built around an intellectual, conceptual skeleton. The harmonic material employed is sparse, the piece containing just 9 chords.
Layers in the music change perspective. Incisive, abrasive sounds in the percussion parts act as joints; dynamics suddenly change and the perspective shifts. Passages in the background abruptly leap to the foreground.
The layer in the background is left to simply ripple the front layer’s surface. There are interruptions in the music, moments of rigid musical standstill, not only in the full orchestra but also within smaller instrumental layers. Groups of musicians lose themselves in isolated autistic sequences and then suddenly snap out of it, melting once again into the rest of the orchestra.
See-through is a work about the failing of continuity.
press quotes
Making the most of very few ingredients
“Making the most of very few ingredients, composing very strong processes over longer time spans…an exellent feeling for structure.”
— Roeland Hazendonk, De Telegraaf, 11 June 2001
instrumentation
for orchestra
2000
1 piccolo
1 flutes
2 oboes
1 clarinet in E-flat
1 clarinet in B-flat
1 bass clarinet
2 bassoons
4 horns in F
4 trumpets in C
2 tenor trombones
1 bass trombone
1 tuba
1 harp
4 percussion players
Strings
details
Duration 12'
First performance 12 January 2001, Nederlands Studenten Orkest, cond. Micha Hamel
Commissioned by Netherlands Student Orchestra (NSO), Fonds voor de Scheppende Toonkunst
Published by Donemus
audio
performances
Last performance:
-
25 November 2005
Brabants Orkest, cond. John Axelrod
Frits Philipszaal, Eindhoven, Netherlands
