ECLAT 10

Impossible Situations

Øyvind Torvund: Plans for future violin and keyboard pieces (2017–2018) ^GP
Lisa Streich: SAFRAN (2017)
Kristine Tjøgersen: Silent Disco (2019) ^WP
Lars Petter Hagen: 10 Svendsen Romances (2018) ^GP
Alberto Bernal: Numbers #2–variations on a theme by Brahms (2018) ^GP

Duo Hellqvist/Amaral
Karin Hellqvist, violin
Heloisa Amaral, piano

Max Sauer, sound direction
Filippa Berglund, architecture/scenography

Impossible Situations was made possible through the kind support of Nordic Culture Point and the Nordic Culture Fund.

The composition commissions to Kristine Tjøgersen and Lars Petter Hagen were supported by Arts Council Norway

Out of the intimacy of a chamber music situation, the duo Hellqvist/Amaral wants to create utopian spaces. A change of perspective is intended to expand instrumental, medial, performative boundaries and also their own role. Trusting in the changing power of artistic creation, they ask which abilities, expectations and traditions we should still preserve today–and how they can be used as sources of renewal. The works address these questions directly: Øyvind Torvund’s »Plans« deal with ambitious utopian ideas, the implementation of which would be impractical or simply too expensive (e.g. open-air concerts with flying musicians). Lisa Streich speculates on different degrees of sweetness of saffron: »… more sweet than bitter and not sweet like sugar, but many different dimensions of sweetness… which also contain tenderness in a way…« And Alberto Bernal uses the example of Johannes Brahms’ 3rd Violin Sonata to investigate how information and perception change through massive repetitions of the seemingly identical.