• Eivind Buene
  • Langsam und Schmachtend (2003)

  • Edition Wilhelm Hansen Copenhagen (World)
  • str
  • 13 min

Programme Note

Langsam und Schmachtend is an attempt to write slow music. The work revolves around several dissolving musical memories. The music stops and lingers in suspended moments, small movements are magnified. The title is the tempo indication in Richard Wagners Tristan und Isolde. I have worked with material from the canon of western music in several works, and the vorspiel to Tristan und Isolde is probably one of this history's greatest icons. Langsam und Schmachtend is a meditation on the first minute of this music. Not on the famous Tristan-chord, but on the rising and falling lines and movements and the friction between melodic and harmonic surfaces. This material is the nucleus of musical movements that folds itself out indepenenly of the Wagnerian origin. The piece is dedicated to my daughter Rikke, who was born at the time this music was written. So it's not totally out of place to finish it off with a lullaby.

- Eivind Buene

Scores

Score preview

Features

  • The Investigating Composer: 50 years of Buene
    • The Investigating Composer: 50 years of Buene
    • In 2023, we celebrate the 50th birthday of Norwegian composer/writer Eivind Buene. 25 years ago, Buene was among the Norwegian pioneers of the artistic movement called “Retromodernism.” “Retromodernism” focuses on how the past is used to shape the present, a focus that is a cornerstone in Eivind Buene’s composing.

Discography