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Track Listing:

1
The Sorrow of Loneliness
2
Waltz
3
Songs about the Sea
4
Dance in the Night
5
Weddings and Funerals

Stavanger Symphony Orchestra :

Gisle Kverndokk - Symphonic Dances


In 2013, the Norwegian Ministry of Culture challenged the Stavanger Symphony Orchestra (SSO) to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the Norwegian ConstiTo Dance through the World

"Symphonic Dances" by Mr. Gisle Kverndokk has been popular on many North American radio networks and stations. Swedish journalist, Ms. Hanna Höglund, referred to the "Symphonic Dances" as one of the most interesting CD's released in 2018. Mr. Kverndokk has been nominated to the Musical Publisher Price (Musikkforleggerprisen) and the Stavanger Symphony Orchestra has been nominated for the Spellemann Award (Spellemansprisen) for the recording. How can one compose melodies from around the world and transform them from a cacophony to a symphony?

Bjarte Mo, violinist from the Stavanger Symphony Orchestra, had the concept to make a multicultural musical project. When the orchestra received a grant from the Arts Council of Norway, related to the National Celebration of the Norwegian Constitutional Bicentenary in 2014, they contacted the Norwegian-Kurdish cultural politician Ms. Gulale Samiei who became a key participant in the project. International musicians based in Stavanger were invited to present songs and melodies from their respective countries and recordings were made from these evenings. The orchestra hired Gisle Kverndokk to create a symphonic work based on the melodies from around the world.     

"We wish to use this work to celebrate the constitution as it says something about the present society," SSO cellist Hjalmar Kvam, "and we celebrate the past with works by Norwegian composers Edvard Grieg and Eivind Groven and others – and the "Symphonic Dances" celebrates the present."

The Stavanger Symphony Orchestra gave Gisle Kverndokk carte blanche, and he could pick as few or as many melodies as he wished. But it was one non-negotiable demand: If you use a melody, the musician who presented the melody must be able to recognize it when hearing the work.

"My thought, once I had digested the assignment, was that it had to be a work that could stand by it's own right," says Kverndokk. "The listeners do not need to know too much about the background of the work to enjoy the music." It was also important for Kverndokk to be able to present all the groups in the orchestra, as a kind of showpiece or concerto for orchestra.

"I decided to be very clear. Often in the contemporary music things are changed and a lot of unnecessary elements are added. I became very attached to these original melodies, because they were so beautiful, and the melodies contained a lot of soul in the recordings that I heard, therefore the most important thing for me was to transfer these feelings and produce clear and simple music."

Symphonic Dances had the very first presentation on the 30th of April 2014 at the Stavanger Concert Hall in commeration of the National Celebration of the Norwegian Constitutional Bicentenary.

When Stavanger Symphony Orchestra decided to record Symphonic Dances in 2017, the American conductor Ken-David Masur was hired. For him, one of the most appealing elements in the piece was the universal and the limitless emotions in the music. "The brilliant concept here is that Gisle has abstracted the melodies away from the cultural bias where they would belong and he has found in the melodies what connects us as humans. It's not about how the Asian ancestors lived or how it feels to be central-European, but rather it's about the connection between all of us. About pain and joy; going through life; celebration and sorrow."  

Gisle Kverndokk believes that people are listening simply because they like the music. "There are a lot of beautiful melodies here and I have met that people who have listened to the CD and had expected to hear some very advanced contemporary music, but then the work contains melodic accessibility and brings joy to the listeners."

Producer Ulrike Schwarz adds: The Symphonic Dances are a celebration of ethnic diversity within a western context. Gisle Kverndokk transformed the original tunes into melodies and textures that can be played by the palette of a modern symphony orchestra. Furthermore, Kverndokk, a self-described dramatic romantic, chose a traditional, but open, classical form of composition in order to use all of these "donated" melodies in the "Symphonic Dance Suite" form. Many composers have based some of their most beloved pieces on folk music tunes, domestic and foreign, as this is how music lives and tradition is being kept and developed. Dvorak's 9th symphony and his "American String Quartet," Bartók's "Romanian Dances" and "Hungarian Dances," Brahms' "Hungarian Dances," and every second movement of every single symphony of Gustav Mahler's are just a very brief but prominent testimonial to this argument. Norway's own, Edvard Grieg, is deeply rooted in the Norwegian folk music tradition. However, one will have to reach very deep into the musical canon and still may not find a piece that uses, harmonizes and celebrates universal melodies and feelings from all over the world in one piece as Gisle Kverndokk's "Symphonic Dances" does.

Symphonic Dances was published at SSO Recordings on 5th of October 2018 and produced by Ulrike Schwarz with multi-Grammy winner Jim Anderson engineering. The recording took place at the Stavanger Concert Hall, Fartein Valen, and was mixed at Skywalker Ranch, Marin, California. The recording is available not only in stereo CD, and vinyl, but also on a Blu-ray Disc in high-resolution stereo, 5.1 surround, immersive Dolby Atmos.

Stavanger Symphony Orchestra has been nominated to the Spellman's Prize (Spellemannsprisen) in the category ‘Classical' with Symphonic Dances. The Spellman's Prize was awarded at Chateau Neuf in Oslo, Norway on Saturday 30th of March 2019.

Mr. Gisle Kverndokk was also been nominated for the Musical Publisher Prize (Musikkforleggerprisen) in the categories the Composition of the Year (Årets Verk) and the Creator of the Year (Årets Opphaver). The prizes were awarded on 27th of February 2019 at the Vulcan Arena in Oslo, Norway.


tution by addressing the concept of cultural diversity. SSO commissioned a work by Gisle Kverndokk, who created Symphonic Dances by weaving together a diverse musical narrative based on folk music from the different ethnic groups living in the Stavanger area.

SSO planned to use the piece, along with older and more famous Norwegian music, in a special concert that would not only celebrate the past but also the present, pointing to a future safeguarded by the framework of the Norwegian Constitution.

SSO invited musicians from Stavanger's immigrant community to perform and record examples of their folk songs, which Kvendokk used as inspiration to create something new. In the end, he incorporated the music from twelve different countries: Norway, Sweden, Poland, Greece, Kurdistan, Madagascar, Eritrea, China, Afghanistan, Iran, Cuba and Venezuela.

"After a while, I began to feel that all this music was becoming my own, that the material no longer came from different parts of the world but was rather a wide spectrum of beautiful melodies and rhythms living their own lives in my head. Everything fell into place, my musical imagination was running at full speed, and the piece almost wrote itself," explained Kverndokk

The concerto itself has five movements: "The sorrow of loneliness", "Waltz", "Songs about the sea", "Dance in the night"and "Weddings and funerals". Kverndokk revealed the genesis of his work: "I started to see some thematic connections: some of the songs were about the sea, some were about love, God, weddings and funerals."

Symphonic Dancesis a work that is alternately touching, reflective, groovy and fun, full of longing and celebration – truly reflecting the reality of Stavanger's culturally diverse society.

 

"The Symphonic Dances for Orchestra"

When the great Norwegian composers of the 19th Century, Edvard Grieg, Johan Svendsen or Johan Halvorsen, were searching for their own musical language they found it by collecting folk music. But what would it sound like if theywere to collect folk music in Norway, today?

In 2015, the Stavanger Symphony Orchestra (SSO) wanted to reflect upon the variety of cultures in our modern society and asked me to create a symphonic piece based on folk music from the different ethnical groups living in the Stavanger area. It was to be a large-scale concert work, and I was free to do whatever I wanted. I proposed to write a concerto for orchestra, where all of the different groups of instruments could be highlighted and I could demonstrate the variety of the SSO.

Over two hours of recorded music was provided to me and I fell in love with it. The performances were wonderful, with so much emotion, joy, pride and integrity. Some of the music was easy to transcribe, but there were challenges, and my versions couldn't always be precise. These melodies weren't going to be performed on folk instruments and I wanted to show how I experienced the music when I first heard it. Thus showing how I could transform these melodies into the orchestral palette.

I began to see thematic connections: There were songs were about the sea, about love, God, weddings and funerals. So I organized the material with these themes and I ended up using music from every country represented in the recordings: Norway, Sweden, Poland, Greece, Kurdistan, Madagascar, Eritrea, China, Afghanistan, Iran, Cuba and Venezuela.

After a while, I felt that all this music became my own, that the material no longer came from different parts of the world, but rather a wide spectrum of beautiful melodies and rhythms living their own lives in my head. Then, everything fell into place and now my musical imagination was on full speed. The piece almost wrote itself.

"Symphonic Dances for Orchestra" has 5 movements:

  1. "The Sorrow of Loneliness"

The introduction is a beautiful song from Afghanistan and an old poem from the 14th century: "Oh! The greatest of all beautiful ones! Ah! The sorrow of loneliness." The song is about longing, yearning, for God to return, but I also felt that it was a song, about longing for love. As a contrast, there are dance melodies from Kurdistan and Venezuela.

  1. "Waltz"

There were several waltz-like songs in the 2nd movement and I paired a beautiful waltz melody from Madagascar with a Norwegian and a Swedish one. In the last section a beautiful Chinese melody is on top.

  1. "Songs about the Sea"

The beautiful main theme of the 3rd movement is from Greece and is followed by a song from China. To bind these two together there is a haunting piece from Iran, originally played on the santoor. I tried to recreate its beautiful sound with harp, piano and melodic percussion.

  1. "Dance in the Night"

The 4th movement features an energetic melody from Kurdistan: "Evening Melody." It is the main theme, which is combined with a dance song from Poland and a very rhythmical and exciting song from Venezuela. In the middle of everything is a Kletzmer melody for the brass section of my creation. All of this had a very lively dancing spirit and I imagined a dance party late at night, thus giving the movement its title.

  1. "Weddings and Funerals"

The final movement features a light and happy funeral song from Madagascar, and a sad wedding march from Sweden. Madagascar celebrates that a soul travels from this world to the next, so a funeral can have a positive feeling. In Scandinavia, in the old days, weddings could be formal and solemn. The Madagascar melody goes through the entire movement, and a very passionate melody from Cuba is placed on top of it. A song from Eritrea is in the middle of this to create rhythmic contrast and the climax is the big, broad Swedish wedding march. The piece fades out with the Madagascar funeral song.

I realized that the work had to be called "Symphonic Dances." It is almost like a symphony, but all the movements have a dancing quality to them. - Gisle Kverndokk, composer