Rituals

A program about Rituals by Maya Fridman. Originally, the Dutch-Russian cellist would play this program within the intimate setting of a traditional, nomadic yurt – eight times, with an audience of only 16 people each time. Today Maya shows that the stage of the Muziekgebouw, with the camera very close by, can be just as intimate.

Maya: “Rituals are a part of all human societies, they connect us to our inner world where magic exists and the imagination rules. The pieces I’m going to play in this program were inspired by the magical powers of spells, invocations and nature itself, the greatest source of what we call ‘mythological’ and ‘divine'”.

Maya Fridman (winner Dutch Classical Talent 2019) is one of the most interesting young musicians of this moment. Her playing and eloquence leave no one untouched and with her many new projects she creates special and surprising experiences.

Program explanation

Medusa by Saskia Venegas (première)

This piece is made possible by the Fonds Podiumkunsten.

Tuusula by Bryce Dessner 2016
I composed this solo work for cellist Nicolas Altstaedt two summers ago when I was composer in residence at Pekka Kuusisto’s beautiful chamber music festival, Meidän Festivaali, in Sibelius’s hometown of Tuusula. Tuusula is small lake town about 40 minutes from Helsinki, and was a haven for composers and painters in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The place remains untouched by development with all the original houses standing as they were. Sibelius’s beautiful house, Ainola, is now a museum, and Pekka’s small festival is held next door in a set of cabins and wooden performance spaces that date from the same era. I was inspired by Pekka’s amazing ability to bring together artists from disparate backgrounds, including some of Europe’s finest chamber musicians, as well as a deeply original mix of repertoire—old music and new music without prejudice to either—and with audiences seemingly willing to follow him in any direction. The place itself, the woods and water and light, inspired me to write this cello solo for Nicolas, which was not planned as part of the festival. I would write a bit of the piece every day, which accounts for its improvisatory feeling, and at the end of the week Nicolas premièred it in a chapel on the edge of the lake where Sibelius was baptized. Afterwards, the three of us rowed a wooden boat across the lake and had a sauna. According to Pekka, this is not an entirely uncommon occurrence in Finland.

Bryce Dessner is a vital and rare force in new music. He has won Grammy Awards as a classical composer and with the band The National, of which he is founding member, guitarist, arranger, and co-principal songwriter. He is regularly commissioned to write for the world’s leading ensembles, from Orchestre de Paris to the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and is a high-profile presence in film score composition, with credits including Alejandro González Iñárritu’s The Revenant, for which he was Grammy and Golden Globe nominated. This year his album Tenebre with renowned German string orchestra, Ensemble Resonanz, won both an Opus Klassik award in Germany and a Diapason d’Or in France.

Dessner collaborates with some of today’s most creative and respected artists, including Philip Glass, Katia and Marielle Labèque, Paul Simon, Sufjan Stevens, Jonny Greenwood, Bon Iver, Nico Muhly, and Steve Reich. His orchestrations can be heard on the latest albums of Paul Simon, Bon Iver and Taylor Swift.

VATNASKUGGI- Meeting Your Water Shadow by FJOLA EVANS (première)
Fjóla Evans is a Canadian/Icelandic composer and cellist. Her work explores the visceral physicality of sound while drawing inspiration from patterns of natural phenomena. Autocorrect describes her work as a “texturing fog.” Commissions and performances have come from musicians such as Bang on a Can All-Stars pianist Vicky Chow, Quince Contemporary Vocal Ensemble, and the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra. Her work has been featured on the MATA Festival, Bang on a Can Marathon, Ung Nordisk Musik, and the American Composers Orchestra’s SONiC Festival. She has studied composition with Julia Wolfe, cello performance with Matt Haimovitz, and completed a graduate degree in composition at the Yale School of Music in 2018.

Recent projects include a collaboration with animator Amanda Bonaiuto on a new work for Echo Chamber, the premiere of The Visitor for Toronto’s Continuum Ensemble and TorQ Quartet, and the release of Bearthoven’s recording of Shoaling on Cantaloupe Music. Fjóla is the 2017 winner of the Robert Fleming Prize—an award given by the Canada Council for the Arts to one composer annually.

Thin Air by Calliope Tsoupaki (2020)
With Festivals for Compassion festivals around Europe express their solidarity in these times of Corona by presenting a new solo composition by the Greek-Dutch composer Calliope Tsoupaki. The composition was premièred on the Dutch NPO Radio 4 on 20 June. After this, like a relay race of compassion, the work tours through Europe travelling from festival to festival

Calliope Tsoupaki (Piraeus, Greece, 1963) makes music that has a mood of timelessness. Her objective is expressing the essence as simply and clearly as possible. In her compositions she uses elements of early and contemporary music as well as the music of Greece and the Middle East. Combining these aspects, she skillfully creates a completely personal style.

Her music is praised for its melodic character, warm sound and emotional quality. To date her oeuvre consists of more than 100 works for diverse instrumentation and instruments from different cultures (qanun, ney, kemençe, hurdy gurdy, vielle, viola da gamba, pan flute), from solo to orchestral works, choral music, dance, theatre, opera and multi-sensory projects. Tsoupaki has been living in the Netherlands since 1988 and teaches composition at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague. On the 25th of November 2018 she was appointed as “Composer Laureate of the Netherlands” for the coming two years.

Spell Cycle by Wilma Pistorius (2019)
Spell Cycle is inspired by the idea of witches and magic. Magic, in my interpretation, is the power of words, sounds, gestures to influence the environment, to touch the hearts and minds of those therein and open new realms of experience. What is music, then, if not magical? And in creating it, the female artist steps into one of the most ancient and archetypal of female roles: the witch. In this sense, the essence of witch-magic is the feminine creative force. The piece is based on a Zulu creation myth of Mamaravi, the great goddess who made the world, and like her story it is a ritual, a dance and a lullaby. Through the piece, like a golden thread or a spell, runs a text in Zulu, the magical language of my childhood.

Wilma Pistorius (1991, Belville – South Africa) works have been performed in prestigious concert halls including the Concertgebouw and Orgelpark in Amsterdam, Anton Phillipszaal in The Hague, De Toonzaal in Den Bosch and Muziekgebouw Eindhoven, at various festivals such as Gaudeamus Muziekweek, November Music, CelloBiennale Amsterdam, and Cellofestival Zutphen. She has worked and played together with renowned musicians such as the Atlas Ensemble, Harrie Starreveld, Doris Hochscheid, Frans van Ruth, and Dhruba Ghosh.

As a cellist, Wilma is especially interested in performing contemporary music, preferably less-known pieces for cello solo and in small ensembles. She also loves the rich cello suites of Johann Sebastian Bach, and enjoys improvising and playing in experimental settings.

Her more recent works are characterised by a kind of “mysterious feminine” ambiance. As a woman composer (or composatrice), she enjoys creating something that is specifically female, and which other women can relate to. In her works, she explores intimate themes of femininity, and the question of what it means to be a woman in this day and age. She also particularly enjoys playing with different colours of sound, and allows myself to be inspired by what her senses perceive. The aesthetics of Japanese Zen art and Indian classical music have also been significant sources of influence and inspiration. Recently, she has been experimenting with the combination of sound and movement, using theatricality as an extension of her musical language, as well as exploring the interesting field of tension that lies at the intersection of different musical styles.

Egidius for a singing cello player by Kaveh Vares (première)
“Egidius is a lament filled with emotions of loss, pain and longing.The poem was written by Jan van Hulst or Jan Moritoen during the 14th century for the death of a friend Egidius Michaelis. The poet envies Egidius and complains that he’s still alive. What I find very interesting is where the poet urges Egidius to keep a free space for him in the sky so they can join each other once more in happiness.

Since ten years ago when I learned about this poem, the sound of the words and the beautiful expressions and it’s simple meanings haunted my heart and mind. The simplicity and universality of the sense of longing for a lost one guided me to write this piece.” Kaveh Vares

Egidius, waer bestu bleven, mi lanct na di, gheselle mijn.
Du coors die doot, du liets mi tleven  

Dat was gheselscap, goet ende fijn.
Het sceen teen moeste ghestorven sijn
Nu bestu in den troon verheven, claerre dan der zonnen scijn, alle vruecht es di ghegheven

 Egidius, waer bestu bleven, mi lanct na di gheselle mijn.
Du coors die doot, du liets mi tleven

 Nu bidt vor mi, ic moet nog sneven, ende in de weerelt liden pijn.
Verware mijn stede di beneven
Ic moet nog zinghen een liedekijn, nochtan moet emmer ghestorven sijn

 Egidius, waer bestu bleven, mi lanct na di gheselle mijn.
Du coors die doot, du liets mi tleven

Egidius, where did thy go? I long for thy, dear friend of mine. You chose death and left me life.
Our friendship was one pure and fine. But it seemed this had to die. Now you are lifted to the throne divine. Brighter than a sunray shines. All of salvation was given thee.
Egidius, where did thy go? I long for thee, dear friend of mine. You chose death and left me life.
Pray for me, as I still must endure life. And suffer in this world for now. Hold me the seat that is next to you. And give me time, as I must end my song. Some day I will follow thee, as we all do.
Egidius, where did thy go? I long for thy, dear friend of mine. You chose death and left me life.

(Translation Lex van Haart, 2009)

Kaveh Vares is known as a multi-stylist composer who writes music in many different styles and for different disciplines. He works with orchestras and ensembles, with dance and theater companies, and with films and television-series.

Aube by Karen Tanaka  (première)
Aube was inspired by Arthur Rimbaud’s poem of the same name from his collection Les Illuminations. The cello plays along with the pre-recorded electronic part that evokes images of stillness and color of dawn, the awaking of nature, a glimpse of the goddess, and the passing of time.  Aube was written for and dedicated to Maya Fridman.

Karen Tanaka’s works have been performed by distinguished orchestras and ensembles worldwide including the BBC Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Netherlands Radio Symphony Orchestra, Brodsky Quartet, Gothic Voices, among many others. After studying composition at Toho Gakuen School of Music in Tokyo, she moved to Paris in 1986 to study with Tristan Murail and work at IRCAM. In 1987 she received the Gaudeamus Prize in the Netherlands. In 1990-91 she studied with Luciano Berio in Florence.

In 2012 she was selected as a fellow of the Sundance Institute’s Composers Lab for feature films and mentored by Hollywood’s leading composers. Recently, she served as an orchestrator for the BBC’s TV series, Planet Earth II. The animated film she scored, Sister, was nominated for the 92nd Academy Awards for Best Animated Short Film.

Her music is published by Chester Music in London (Wise Music Group), Schott Music in New York (PSNY), and Editions BIM in Switzerland. Karen Tanaka lives in Los Angeles and teaches composition at California Institute of the Arts.