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Jostein Stalheim - Flate for string quartet and piano (2002)
(b. 23. Voss, July 1960)
First performance:
Gunnar Sævigsal, Bergen, November 21st 2000
Students from the Grieg Academy, led by Ricardo Odriozola
Jostein Stalheim was born in Voss, Norway in 1960 and started composing at an early age. When only 17 years old, his first works were broadcast on both radio and television. He studied composition and accordion at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Copenhagen, Sibelius Academy and at the Norwegian State Academy of Music. Stalheim appears regularly in European festivals as soundpainter, performer and composer.
Stalheim has written music for orchestra, chamber-ensembles, solo, multimedia and also site-specific productions. Stage music comprises a considerable part of his production; a.o. the opera “Pr.Warrants Progress” and the ballets; “Watch”, “Volatile”, “Alrekr” and “Kast”. He has worked in theatres both as composer and musician, among others The Royal Theatre in Copenhagen, Hordaland Teater, Den Nationale Scene, The Norwegian National Ballet and Danseteatret/Carte Blanche in Norway. He has received commissions from ensembles both in Norway and abroad.
Stalheim is internationally recognized as an accordion soloist and performs at festivals and with several international orchestras. He had his breakthrough in 1984 in Nordic Solistbiennale were he performed with Esa Pekka Salonen and Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra. He appears in numerous recordings, both as soloist, as chamber musician and with orchestra; for example Broderfolkonsert, the double concerto by Lasse Thoresen with Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra.
He received a Grant from Norwegian Art Council 2014-2015 to compose music for the opera La Peur et les Soins with libretto by Astrid Luisa Niebuhr. He has composed the music for Watch with premiere in Dansens Hus, Oslo.
Stalheim also contributed as a composer to the science opera Rosetta`s Stone; a cooperation between the two librettists Oded Ben-Horin, John F. McGrew and the co-composer John Bilotta with premiere August 12th 2016 in San Francisco. In the same year he had several large projects including Soundpainting with the contemporary ensemble BIT20 and Performance Artist Bergen.
Stalheim’s music has many endearing qualities. It often embraces the absurd and the illogical from an almost childlike perspective. There is never a hint of pretension in it and, with its deadpan delivery it often leaves the listener in doubt as to whether it is meant to be taken seriously or not seriously at all. In common with the music of Messiaen (a composer Stalheim deeply admires) Stalheim’s compositions tend, with their disarming honesty, to have a cleansing effect on the listener. His compositions often feel like suggestions rather than statements. They are never intrusive or imposing and are always entertaining, thought-provoking, surprising and permeated with a fundamental lightness.
Stalheim wrote Flate (Surface) in the summer of 2000 on commission from Schubert Ensemble. The group visited Bergen in November of that year, giving a chamber music seminar to the students of the Grieg Academy and a public performance at Troldsalen - the concert hall next to Grieg's villa in the outskirts of Bergen. Flate was central to the seminar.
As it was meant for a pedagogical project, Stalheim wisely chose to compose the piece in a way that would entice young players to cooperate by listening to each other and rely on each other's cues.
The work is, as the subtitle indicates, based on a three-note motif consisting of a descending minor third and an ascending minor seventh. The shape of the motif, as heard at the very beginning of the piece, has a connection to Webern, but Stalheim's motif has a clearly tonal imprint. While keeping the music to an almost extreme level of simplicity, Stalheim gently plays with the rhythm, creating a sonic landscape where any sense of pulse is absent. Only the musicians, in consort with each other, know where the beat is. This is particularly apparent in the first movement. The second movement introduces rhythm in a more overt way, be it with small staccato outbreaks in the lowest register of the piano or in the sudden fortissimo eruptions in the strings (see mm. 17, 18 and 21) or their concerted portato waves, an effect much beloved by the composer (see mm. 13-21). The third movements again plays with the listener's sense of metre, but now by throwing in short attacks with widely different dynamics in unexpected places. Remnants of the gentle lyricism from the first movement can be heard until, in m. 32 (marked "quasi didgeridoo") the viola and cello introduce a repetitive sequence consisting of a single note played, insistently, in different rhythms, offset by staccato jabs from the piano. The violins eventually join in m. 55, contributing to the claustrophobic atmosphere. Without warning, an increase of speed in the pulse takes place in m. 70 (subito ritmico) unleashing an implacable, overwhelming and eventually brutal crescendo that reaches breaking point in m. 110. Again without warning, the music makes a U-turn and becomes utterly ethereal and incorporeal. The final measure, with its fortissimo downward flourish in the piano, brings to mind the ending of the penultimate movement of Messiaen's "Quatuor pour la fin du Temps".
Stalheim introduces some extended techniques in order to enhance, for young players, the experience of playing contemporary music. These include suddenly stopping the bow on the string (second movement, m. 11), bowing behind the bridge (2nd mov. mm. 22-23, ending of third mov.) and irregular, nervous bowing (first movement, mm. 12-17). This last effect is also frequently found in Stalheim's music.
In the third movement, special attention must be paid to the use of clefs in the piano part. Stalheim chooses, in some cases, to use the small '8' above or under the clef. At others he writes '8va' or '15a' followed by a short discontinuous line at the beginning of system. This implies that the indication applies to the entire system, until 'loco' is indicated.
Ricardo Odriozola, Bergen June 29th 2024
German preface not available
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