Let's say, just for the sake of argument, that you had to put Vagn Holmboe, Denmark's greatest modernist, up against Igor Stravinsky, Russia's greatest modernist composer. To make it fair, let's put Holmboe's Sinfonia Sacra from 1941 up against Stravinsky's Symphony of Psalms from 1930 and Holmboe's three-movement Symphony No. 5 from 1944 up ...
This set of symphonies by Vagn Holmboe is the strongest possible argument that Holmboe is not just the greatest Danish symphonist and not only one of the greatest modernist symphonists: it is proof positive that Vagn Holmboe was the greatest modernist symphonist of all. Committed, compelling, and cogent; driven, dedicated, and deep; linear, lucid, ...
Because BIS recorded the first 12 symphonies of Vagn Holmboe with Owain Arwel Hughes conducting the Århus Symphony Orchestra, Holmboe wrote his 13th and last symphony. At 84 years old and in failing health, Holmboe had lived to hear his symphonies brilliantly recorded in superb performances by Hughes and the Århus and, rejuvenated by what he heard ...
It takes a lot of faith in your basic materials to write a 20-minute-long symphonic movement or a 25-minute symphony in one movement. Every note has to bear the weight of every note that went before it and the whole has to be unified and diverse, convincing and compelling, radiant and luminous. Of the great modernist symphonists of the twentieth ...
Not everyone will enjoy listening to Vagn Holmboe's Sinfonias I-IV (aka the "String Symphonies," aka Chairos). For some, perhaps even many, people, Holmboe's Sinfonias will sound dour and dreary when not despondent and depressing. For some, perhaps even most, people, Holmboe's Sinfonias will sound dimmer and darker then Bartók's Music for strings, ...
Something of Vagn Holmboe's approach to writing concertos may be discerned in his numeration: they are not grouped according to the solo instrument (e.g., Piano Concerto No. 1), but counted merely as Concertos in the sequence of their composition, regardless of the featured instruments. This suggests that the soloist's role is somewhat altered: ...
If you want to start the BIS' series of recordings of the 13 symphonies of the Danish composer Vagn Holmboe, start here. The Symphony No. 1 for chamber orchestra from 1935 is an appealing work of lean, Danish modernism in three light movements. The Symphony No. 3, "Sinfonia rustica," from 1941 is a work based on folk songs built into ferocious ...
From an early work by Carl Nielsen to a contemporary movement by Anders Nordentoft, Trio Ondine attempts to trace the development of modern Danish music on this 2004 release from Dacapo. The medium of the piano trio connects the works, a more obvious unifying feature than the less apparent but significant teacher-student relationships that link ...
Danish composer Vagn Holmboe once described his music as "a microcosm, the reflection of an order which is in itself unfathomable and impossible to form -- like the structure of atoms, or the galaxies of the universe." It is, apparently, all a matter of scale. In Denmark, Holmboe is the great symphonist of the twentieth century. In the great wide ...
Now! Denmark may be an appropriate title for about half of this disc's contents: the first piece suggests that "Then and Now" might be more accurate. Vagn Holmboe's Piano Trio, Op. 64 (1954), is already something of a classic among Danish piano trios, and its neo-Classical form, modified tonality, and quasi-Impressionistic colors mark it as a mid ...
When one thinks of the solo cello repertoire, the six suites of J.S. Bach and the sonata of Zoltán Kodály immediately come to mind, and with some head scratching, perhaps also the etudes of David Popper, but probably little else. So it might surprise some listeners to learn that an impressive body of work for unaccompanied cello has emerged from ...
What was the greatest modernist symphonist the Danes had doing when he wasn't writing symphonies based on his technique of symphonic metamorphosis? He was writing Symphonic Metamorphoses based on his technique of symphonic metamorphosis: four massive and monumental works as long, as driven, as dense, as intense, and as powerful as his symphonies, ...
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