Viola da Gamba

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3 Prelude to Silence - Duo for violin and Viola da Gamba

Incantation for tenor viola da gamba and electronics

Viola da gamba: Steuart Pincombe
Performed LIVE in Fairchild Chapel, Oberlin Conservatory 2010.

NOTE: I apologise for the incessant camera clicking...the reporter there was a bit too enthusiastic the entire time but this movement has less of it... 

Sonata V In E Minor For Viola Da Gamba, Mvt. 1

This is a piece about our tendency to feel immortal – or our inability to really realize that we are mortal. It is also about what happens to us when death suddenly comes uncomfortably close.
The title, “Kostymen sys i det tysta” is in Swedish, the final words of Tomas Tranströmer’s poem “Svarta vykort” which deals with this subject, and an English translation would be “The Suit is Sewn in Silence”.

”Kostymen sys i det tysta” is also a personal composition: in 2016 I was diagnosed with leukemia resulting in several years of treatment.

The piece has two sides:

The music has a kind of inherent uncertainty that comes from the two playing techniques that the entire piece is based on: glissandi and multiphonics. Both techniques create instability and ambivalence regarding pitch, and this “musical anxiety” could illustrate the fear of death felt by someone mortally ill.

But there is also a positive side – and the piece should mainly be considered an optimistic one – because both these playing techniques are also suitable for creating soundscapes full of thoughtfulness, illustrating for example gratitude for life and science and the importance of human relations.

The piece is dedicated to Stockholm Saxophone Quartet, who premiered it in 2022, and also to my sister Anna and her stem cells – without them, it is not certain that I would have been alive today.

Live recording with Stockholm Saxophone Quartet, March 2024 in Stockholm, Sweden.
Painting by Anna Riebe.

Kostymen sys i det tysta (with Stockholm Saxophone Quartet 2024)

Title Music for the ten-part radio fiction "Pedro Paramo" on Radio France! Starting June 2012

Francoise Daudin-Clavaud, Flute
Arnaud Dumond, Guitar
Florent Jodelet, Percussion
Sebastien Surel, Violin
Philippe Foulon, Viola da Gamba

Bolero - for Flute, Guitar, Perc.,Violin and Viola da Gamba

COUNTERPOINT on the original harp solo Just Passing By 

viola da gamba recording  = www.ernststolz.com
harp recording = ANNE = www.harpandsoul.com
mix = THIJS =  www.teejay.nl

viola da gamba/harp

Rehearsal for the premiere in March, 2013 at the Muziekgebouw, Amsterdam. Ere Lievonen, Fokker (31-tone) organ; Mikko Perkola, viola da gamba.

The introductory fanfare uses a 9-note scale (3+4+3+4+3+4+3+4+3=31 steps) in the so called Orwell temperament. The toccata is in extended meantone, making much use of septimal and neutral intervals, 1/5-tones, as well as commas that 31EDO tempers out, such as 176/175.

The viola da gamba is tuned as follows: The 7 strings are tuned to the standard A1-D-G-c-e-a-d1 (with meantone fourths). The seven frets are placed so that the pitches on the A strings are as follows: (A) Bb B C C# Cx D# E (= 3-2-3-2-2-3-3 steps of 31), enabling 21 pitches out of 31.

3 Prelude to Silence - Duo for violin and Viola da Gamba

Kent Olofsson

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