Clare Spollen: accordion
Alex Lyon: clarinet
Fernando Yada Rodrigues: piano
Anne Yin Han: violin
Pentu: guitar
Tabby Griffiths: flute

Recording from open workshop at Goldsmiths, University of London, 6 July 2023

Tending

"Earthward, Ever Circling" (2023) is the first piece in Anna Berg's trilogy that revolves around the ancient Vietnamese Buddhist funeral ritual of playing music for the deceased to help the soul in the reincarnation process. 

About the piece: 
"The living need light, the dead need music". The quote is from a Vietnamese Buddhist funeral ritual, where different forms of music are used to prepare the soul of the newly deceased for reincarnation. Funeral music is an important part of Vietnamese cultural heritage and tradition, that along with many rites across the world is about to disappear. 

The string trio Earthward, Ever Circling (2023) is the first piece in a series where I'm interested in how funeral music is used as a means of communication between living and dead, between the present and eternity. In the piece, this is reflected in the way the phrases move through different registers. 


They reach down towards the earthly and up towards the divine and eternal. The music constantly alternates between these stages. Like the soul's possible movements to its next life, the different elements in the music have different speed and weight, some parts swirling more hectically, while others parts are more static,
waiting.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) is one of the Western thinkers who embraced the idea of reincarnation. In his poem "Gesang der Geister über den Wassern", he writes about how the human soul resembles water; coming from heaven, to heaven it rises, and again it returns to earth, in an eternal, alternating movement. I discovered an English translation of the poem done by the American writer Adam Sedia (b. 1984), where the last verse reads "earthward, ever circling", which is the background for the title of this piece.

The piece was commissioned by Guro Kleven Hagen, Eivind Ringstad and Amalie Stalheim, with support by The Norwegian Composers’ fund. 

The recording is from the premiere February 25th 2023 at Interpuls festival. The mastering is by Mats Claesson. 

Performers
Guro Kleven Hagen, violin
Eivind Ringstad, viola
Sverre Barratt-Due, cello

Score:
https://www.nb.no/noter/produkt/earthward-ever-circling-for-string-trio/

Earthward, Ever Circling (2023) for string trio

Sergei Zagny - Sonata (1990) - Alexey Shmurak 31.01.15 Kiev

Plain Song - James Creed

Composed in 2013.
Performed by the Ives Ensemble:
Josje ter Haar and Emma Breedveld (violins), Ruben Sanderse (viola) and Job ter Haar (cello)

Holt Quartet

a study of gentle and lilting arpeggiation, through repetition and subtle variation. Working with this material, I was drawn to treating it with delicate care and an intuitive sense of humanity. The kindness and patience of others toward their art became a stimulus for my approach in this music.

Performed by Mira Benjamin and Philip Thomas at Music We'd Like to Hear in London on Friday 5th July 2019. 

Mixed by Adam Webster.

kindly, softly

contemporary, experimental, improvised music

Plain Song - James Creed

anne_yin_han