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- Asbjørn Schaathun
A Tabular System (1995)
- Edition Wilhelm Hansen Copenhagen (World)
Programme Note
A Tabular System was commissioned by and written for Swedish oboist Helén Jahren. The work was a long time in the making, and there were many interruptions. Part 1 was conceived as early as 1988, but was not completed until 1993. The idea was to begin with the line that gradually fell apart. When Schaathun embarked upon the second part of the work, he discovered that the act of making something fall apart, of decomposing, was not his forte. The composer was dissatisfied with the results. He decided instead to be constructive and went back to producing melodies by interweaving lines, thus achieveing a constant sense of similarity but at the same time a constant feeling of variation.
The technique of extending the ensemble by adding instruments is a concept derived from Boulez. Although the work seemingly builds up towards a tutti, the composer chooses to change direction and instead focus only on certain colours in the new ensemble. Thus, the work ends in a clarinet trio which is a tribute to Alban Berg and the mournful clarinet chorale in his violin concerto. In this way Schaathun is seeking to evoke something beyond the score.
After various parts of the works were premiered in Bergen and Amsterdam, the work was perforemd in its entirety for the first time in Oslo in the Lindeman Concert Hall at the Norwegian State Academy of Music on 29 March 1995. The first part of the work is dedicated to Helén Jahren and the second to Henk Heuvelmans, director of the Gaudeamus Foundation, Amsterdam, for "their moral and financial support of contemporary music".
The technique of extending the ensemble by adding instruments is a concept derived from Boulez. Although the work seemingly builds up towards a tutti, the composer chooses to change direction and instead focus only on certain colours in the new ensemble. Thus, the work ends in a clarinet trio which is a tribute to Alban Berg and the mournful clarinet chorale in his violin concerto. In this way Schaathun is seeking to evoke something beyond the score.
After various parts of the works were premiered in Bergen and Amsterdam, the work was perforemd in its entirety for the first time in Oslo in the Lindeman Concert Hall at the Norwegian State Academy of Music on 29 March 1995. The first part of the work is dedicated to Helén Jahren and the second to Henk Heuvelmans, director of the Gaudeamus Foundation, Amsterdam, for "their moral and financial support of contemporary music".
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