Doppelbelichtung (2016)
(for violin and samples)

 Bird calls have an incredible intensity - brought about by the syrinx of the bird's throat. They have no larynx at all, but rather several bronchial tubes with inner and outer membranes, the tympanic membranes, which are controlled by a complex muscle system. This allows the almost two-part appearing jumps and the rapid adornments to be created.

The violin is the only instrument that can produce this extreme height - but through a completely different process. That is precisely why it is so appealing to bring both worlds together, like a “narrowing” in counterpoint.

My string quartet “Lichtung” from 2011 already works with photographically accurate transcriptions of bird calls. At the performance of the Cikada Quartet at the Ultima Festival 2013, I was completely fascinated by how Karin Hellqvist was able to imitate the finest nuances of the original sounds, e.g. of a Butcherbird, with the violin. These subtleties require different playing techniques and, above all, a lot of empathy and the finest hearing. Karin Hellqvist then wished to be allowed to be a virtuoso bird and commissioned me to write this solo piece.

Double exposure is a technique from analog photography in which one image is exposed on top of the previous one. In this way, several levels of reality are captured in one picture.

 "In my dark hours, when I suddenly became aware of my own uselessness, when every musical idiom - classical, oriental, old, modern and ultra-modern - seemed to me only as an admirable, arduous experiment, without any final justification, what was left for me but this: to look for the true, lost face of the music somewhere outside, in the woods, in the fields, in the mountains or on the coast, among the birds. "

(Olivier Messiaen April 3, 1959 quoted from Johnson, translator Jan Reichow)

 In short:

Bird calls have an incredible intensity - brought about by the syrinx of the bird's throat. They have no larynx at all, but rather several bronchial tubes with inner and outer membranes, the tympanic membranes, which are controlled by a complex muscle system. This allows the almost two-part appearing jumps and the rapid adornments to be created.

The violin is the only instrument that can produce this extreme height - but through a completely different process. That is precisely why it is so appealing to bring both worlds together, like a “narrowing” in counterpoint.

Double exposure is a technique from analog photography in which one image is exposed on top of the previous one. In this way, several levels of reality are captured in one picture.

The piece was commissioned by Karin Hellqvist and was created in close cooperation.

Commissioned with funds of Arts Council Norway

Dedicated to Karin Hellqvist