Hans Abrahamsen (b. 1952)

[bhodges]

A holiday gift has appeared: The Snow Queen (2019), Hans Abrahamsen's first opera, available on demand (FREE) through 29 January from the Bavarian State Opera. This is the second production, after the premiere in October at the Royal Danish Opera.

https://operlive.de/

Surprised to find no thread on Abrahamsen, one of today's most imaginative composers. My first exposure was Schnee (Snow, 2008) for chamber ensemble. More on that another time, but one young composer I know considers it one of the greatest works of the 21st century so far.

--Bruce

[Maestro267]

I too am surprised there isn't a thread yet, given how well-received Let me tell you was.

[bhodges]

I too am surprised there isn't a thread yet, given how well-received Let me tell you was.

Yes! I saw the Carnegie performance with the great Barbara Hannigan, and afterward, even a handful of skeptics thought it was marvelous.

Just found this NPR piece that I hadn't seen before:

https://www.npr.org/2016/08/22/490927206/stunned-silence-then-a-standing-ovation-for-let-me-tell-you

--Bruce

[relm1]

Fascinating, I will explore him further.  I definitely like what I've heard so far.

[violadude1]

Lately I've been listening to my composer playlists in alphabetical order (by last name). Next on the list is the Danish composer Hans Abrahamsen. What I've listened so far:

Wind Quintet 1 "Landscapes" (1972) Abrahamsen's first Wind Quintet is a very short, concise piece. 3 movements total but only 7 minutes long. Abrahamsen is considered part of the "new simplicity" movement and that really comes through even in these early pieces. Much of the music here is made from repetitions of simple phrases that are built on each other in complex ways. The music here is quite stoic or phlegmatic, in fact the first two movements are literally marked "sans expression". Rather, the music brings to mind "landscapes" of tangled roots that grow out and intersect at various points. In fact, in my opinion it sounds as though the piece starts having already started, as if we've just stumbled on some natural occurrence that was already taking place before we got there. The first movement introduces us to three planes, the first one is a web of simple melodies passed between the three high woodwinds, second is a pulsating rhythmic figure that underpins harmonically dense music on top. This section sounds the most "tangled" and "blurry" The Third is made of opaque, slow moving chords that stand cold and motionless in a "landscape" much more barren than the previous two. The second movement brings us back to the "pulsating" figures, but much sharper and more energetic this time around as various instruments pass around a bouncy version of the pulsating theme in a simple but weirdly complex-sounding way. After a brief return the "opaque" landscape Abrahamsen introduces a new sound, a flurry of quick high woodwind figures. This comes off not as erratic or violent but a natural "growing out" of what has come before. The third movement is the most energetic and fun (although some people might find it annoying and I can see that). It consists of a simple and rather banal "Nursery Rhyme" sounding melody, but hocketed back and forth between the low and high woodwinds so that the melody falls on different accents for the different instruments. This builds in energy until eventually the low woodwinds drop out and the high woodwinds continue the melody but in various 2 against 3 rhythmic arrangements (or at least that's what it sounds like to me, I haven't seen a score). The low woodwinds then bring back the "flurry" landscape from movement two, but descending to the depths of the sound this time. The piece ends inconclusively, like it began, as if whatever we were listening to continues on after we left.

First movement: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eavwk10zRTI Second Movement: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nqvTe8sU9Q Third movement: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pLW9Oa7ilvw

String Quartet 1 "10 Preludes" (1973) As the title suggest, this first string quartet consists of 10 preludes for string quartet. It was originally written just as that, but was retroactively titled as the first string quartet after Abrahamsen wrote more. This piece I find very interesting. As you might expect, each prelude explores a different idea or concept, but there is lots of "connective tissue" between the movements, not necessarily thematic connections like one would expect but certainly many movements and moments within movements parallel each other in certain ways. The first and last prelude are connected in the sense that they are the complete opposite, the first being the most complex and avant-garde sounding (a lot of it sounding reminiscent of the Ligeti String Quartets, elements of both of them actually), the last being a literal straight up early Baroque dance type movement. In this sense, we make a journey from complex to simple throughout the duration of the piece. Prelude 5 and 8 are connected in that they both explore the concept of a pedal tone with shifting harmony that continually changes the context of that tone (an idea that is subtly foreshadowed near the end of prelude 2). Prelude 2 and 7 both begin with scrubby, agitated sixteenth note figures that are punctuated by pizzicato accents. Prelude 6 and 9 both primarily explore slow, meditative melodies in unisons and octaves. The 9th is actually entirely made up of a melody in octaves, something that is "foreshadowed" or built up to by many moments throughout the prelude where the instruments suddenly break into a unison/octave melody. Then there's the folk dance thread running through the preludes. I already mentioned the 10th prelude which has a early baroque dance suite feel whose simplicity is quite reminiscent of folk music. But then there's the 7th prelude which suddenly breaks into some sort of bizzare off-kilter English fiddling(?). I apologize I'm not intimately familiar with European folk music tradition but that's what it sounds like to me. The 4th prelude also has an air of dance music, although very relaxed/melancholic dance music. The third prelude stands out to me as having not many connective strands to the others, but it's the only one of the ten with long, breathed out lines of passion filled lyrical melody.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJ7dbeu169I (The Arditti quartet has the best recording but I can only find links for the separate movements and I don't want to post 10 different links)

Flowersongs for three flutes (1973) This piece was written for three flutes, but the recording I have on my playlist (which, as far as I understand, is the only recording) is played on a recorder ensemble instead, which lends a fantastic haunting sound to the atmosphere of the piece. This is one of my favorite pieces of the bunch although I don't have much to say about it. It's a piece built of repetitive and complex rhythmic and melodic patterns in a style reminiscent of the early minimalists, but rather than slowly evolve the patterns, Abrahamsen abruptly shifts them, dragging us through a variety of atmospheres throughout the piece. The atmosphere created by the combination of these patterns are is just fantastic, it's sometimes magical and mystical sounding, sometimes haunting, sometimes creepy, sometimes overwhelmingly bright and childlike (the end, in particular) and sometimes downright insane sounding (insane as in the music's "threshold of sanity" is close to breaking, I'm thinking of a passage about 3 minutes into the piece in particular). I do wonder now what it sounds like on actual flutes because I think the recorders provide an excellent timbre to the piece.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=quS_-xmGIjw

Stratifications for orchestra (1973-75) I have to admit, this is a piece I have not wrapped my head completely around yet, but think the pulsating theme in the first woodwind quintet (the second movement's version in particular) but expanded out into a full orchestral score. The entire score is underpinned by a basic pulse that is always there, but the sections of the orchestra are all "playing to the beat of their own drum", so to speak. There's a constant agitation, a constant sense of "tug of war" present throughout the nearly 9 minutes of the piece. This results, according to the composer's own words, in "The music (being) in a night-mare condition, where it is not getting anywhere in spite of a great dynamic display". Staying true to the "new simplicity" style all the individual parts of the orchestra are still quite simple repetitive figures, but combined together in rhythmic disunity, creates a giant, complex monstrosity of sound. Again in the composers own words, the piece reaches a resolution by "finally is liberating itself and rising 'in triumph'." This refers to the way that the piece ends by slowly disintegrating, or dissolving, into the upper registers of the orchestra. It's a pretty cool piece that is continuing to grow on me. Oh also it has an insanely intrusive (not in a bad way) part for a lion's roar.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ky1t41S2bZ4


Canzone for solo Accordian (1978) This is a nice little accordion piece that I quite enjoyed. As far as I can tell it's in a ternary form with the outer sections being quaint and peaceful, reminding one of small village life or something to that effect. The middle section is more agitated and reaches a climax on a fantastically powerfully sounding tremolo, similar to those used a lot by Gubaidulina, to those who know her music. It does end a bit hauntingly in a way that kind of puzzles me though. The melody at the beginning is reused for another accordion piece written much later called "Air", which is in turn, is used as the basis for the first movement of his 3rd string quartet.

[not edward]

New Schnee just drdpped:

[asin]B09NKH4RC1[/asin]

I was always going to buy this as soon as it appeared, as while I've got somewhat mixed feelings about Abrahamsen's work of the last 10 years, I think Schnee is a remarkable achievement, showing the composer at his very best. (For those who don't know it, its antecedents might be described as later Ligeti spiced with Pärt, Grisey and Nørgård... but the soundworld is one the composer has made his own.)

I'll have to revisit the ensemble recherche recording to be certain, but on first listening I think I prefer this new reading with the Lapland Chamber Orchestra and John Storgårds; a superficial view might be that where ensemble recherche play up the links to Central European modernism, this is a more Northern European view of the piece. Regardless, it's a thoroughly imaginative aural experience; the extended techniques making their point and the retunings during the intermezzi adding a subtle destabilization to the later canons.