‘Belgian National Orchestra’

MUSIC AS UTOPIA

The orchestra as a soloist? We’re all familiar with the concept of the soloist who performs with an orchestra, like violin virtuoso Vadim Repin, for example, in Prokofiev’s Concerto No. 2. With this concert Prokofiev wanted to get away from the old-fashioned; simply a composition of pure musicality. A concert with a cosmopolitan character; the Russian composer wrote it during a tour of Western Europe.
Generally speaking, a symphony requires the entire orchestra to work together as one organism, as in Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7, which is perhaps the most perfect example… A musical utopia.
But the contemporary composer Pascal Dusapin wrote seven Solos for Orchestra. In the first part of these orchestral solos you can hear the struggle between ‘rhythmic savagery and melodic flexibility’, according to the composer. His music strives to reconcile what are essentially two opposing instincts. While one stubbornly attempts to return the original melodious harmony, the other seems to want to sow division. The battle is on! Dusapin chose ‘Go’ as the title for the first solo, because of the ‘firm resolve you hear in it’ (Let’s go!). It is also, however, a reference to the traditional Chinese strategic board game, in which you use simple materials to surround more and new territories.”