Composed September 2016 to February 2017 and workshopped by the Royal Academy of Music Symphony Orchestra conducted by Christopher Austin.

I found the idea for Yggdrasil from a breif obsession with scandenavian mythology which lead to me purchasing a copy of the Poetic Edda. In the Old Norse poem I stumbled across this Tree, the image of which immediately captured my imagination:

'There stands an ash called Yggdrasil,
A mighty tree showered in white hail.
From there come the dews that fall in the valleys.
It stands evergreen above Urd’s Well.
From there come maidens, very wise,
Three from the lake that stands beneath the pole.
One is called Urd, another Verdandi,
Skuld the third; they carve into the tree
The lives and destinies of children.'

Fundamentaly this image expresses a concept of time entwined with destiny. The Well of Urd represents the past tense, the reservoir of completed and ongoing actions that feed the tree and shape its growth. In this way Yggdrasil represents the very present, what is realised at every pasing instance. Finally the water corresponds to future, intention and necessity. It permeates the image flowing up from the well through the tree and descending as dew, returning to the well. So time is cyclic, the present returns to the past altering it and inturn influencing the new present.

The piece is characterised by a returning fanfare figure. This shard of material remains unchanged whilst the surrounding musical context shapes the way it is perceived. The stillness of the opening is quickly upset by an earthy restlessness which gradualy builds momentum and gains energy culminating in a climax where the energy ultimately consumes  itself, evaporating completely. 
A performance lasts approximately 7 minutes.

Yggdrasil - for Orchestra *Excerpt

Composer/Orchestrator based in the UK/London

Yggdrasil - for Orchestra *Excerpt

Joshua Hickin