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Cover, the concert hall magazine | ||||||||||
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PRELUDES FOR A NEW ERA Five Preludes began the evening, and they were reminiscent of five eager fingers on a hand reaching out as if to seize the varnished feathers of dawn, gentle beginnings. In the melting waters of spring with flocks of birds appearing here and there, these preludes are a sensitive volley discharged with full orchestral force. WHAT CHARACTERIZES IT as great music is that it is music for open worlds. | Rehnqvist writes a masterpiece What is striking about the suite of five preludes that Rehnqvist ends with an open question is their geographical location. Their folk music elements are not tied ball-and-chain to a number of quotations, instead, they are rooted in dialectical melodic impulses, adding creative consonants to the typically Rehnqvist-ian linearity and polish, the given prototype being the Swedish cow-calling song tradition. In the Preludes, two outposted solo trumpets imitate the calls, whereas in Sun Song, the calling is done vocally by Lena Willemark, who manages in some amazing way to reconcile the high-soaring ”fourth voice” of the castrato with firey, white rage, ……, Writing this kind of music is a great achievement. Using your creativity to activate the audience as thinking beings is an even greater one. Thank goodness Karin Rehnqvist exists! | |||||||
Effects without seeking effects Karin Rehnqvist’s music has effects without seeking effects, is expressive without being sentimental, and beautiful without being ingratiating. | ||||||||
Cries and whispers Lena Willemark stands in front of the horn section, swaying her hips, during the second movement of Sun Song (1994). The vibraphone player is wildly occupied with playful chromatics. Lena is dancing. Completely unconsciously, she embodies the Rehnqvist esthetics. Music is not just something we experience with head and hand, but with our entire circulatory system. Singing, calling, whispering, shouting women have their given place in the work of Karin Rehnqvist. The human voice, in all its forms. In the very first measures of the premier performance of the orchestral piece Preludes for Large Orchestra, she has managed to transport me to a valley where the echoes rebound from the woodwinds to the trumpets and back again, reminiscent of the folk music tradition reflecting prehistoric calling by cowherds in the mountains. This was what I saw as the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra played, conducted by Niklas Willén. In comparison with the metaphorical collage technique that characterizes Sun Song, the Preludes are lyrical and abstract. But the calling is still there. As a listener, I was eager to answer. | ||||||||
About Was someone calling? – Happening at Hötorget There is a spiritual dimension to Karin Rehnqvist’s musik: something sacred residing in the quotidian. When the trumpets shout across Stockholm’s market square Hötorget on a Saturday afternoon, and cow-calling, singing voices blend with the buzz of the traffic and the shouts of the vendors, an atmosphere of expectancy and receptiveness takes over the square. Between high piles of early strawberries and a pigeon-crowned statue of Orpheus stands Karin Rehnqvist herself, conducting the musical traffic between heaven and earth. No one would be surprised if a herd of cows stormed out of the parking garage, enticed by the calls, to participate in this rite. | ||||||||
About To the Angel with the firey hands - Concert for female chorus, solo voice and four instruments In the Grünewaldsalen on Sunday afternoon, ritual was also the word that described the ambiance, where a collection of white-headed beings emerged from an invisible shaft in time, wrung their hands, sighing, and had invented an opera-cum-life in which the tone of voice was uniquely her own. | ||||||||
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