It can start with a sound. A seed. Marie Samuelsson (born 1956) is all ears for everything that makes a noise round about her. Who knows what sound might chance to stick in her mind, germinating and becoming the source of a large-scale and imposing compositional structure. This has occurred a number of times. Once she happened to bang on a big ventilation shaft made of galvanized metal and discovered the wealth of sounding possibilities it had. The result was Air Drum III (1999), premiered on Swedish TV by the Swedish
Radio Symphony Orchestra. It is a frequently performed orchestral work in which three percussionists play on the unusual instrument - at the disposal of any interested ensemble. The instrument has to date been on tour throughout Sweden and even as far as France.
She was fascinated by recordings of wolves and processed their howling electronically. In the completed piece, saxophonist Jörgen Pettersson plays together with the recorded wolves – with roots in ancient times and at the same time a step into the future. As always when it comes to Marie. In the Wolf´s Eye (I vargens öga) has been performed in more than ten European countries, as well as in Turkey and South Africa, and was selected for the Nordic Music Days in 1998.
Electronic sonorities are featured in a number of her works, and she learned more about this kind of composing when she studied with Pär Lindgren and was chosen to attend an exclusive course for professional composers at IRCAM in Paris.
Since the turn of the millennium her creativity has meant that the boundaries have been extended and the content has been deepened. She has, with imposing vigour, presented one masterpiece after the other with ever varied structure and expression. Rotations is a work for string orchestra that Musica Vitae took with them on their tour of Italy. In Sweden and Finland, Anna Lindal has performed what some critics have maintained is Samuelsson's most important work to date: the violin concerto Bastet the Sun Goddess.
In 2007 a four-day-long composer festival at the Stockholm Concert Hall was devoted to her music, during which nineteen of her works in various genres were performed. Singla , a commissioned work for orchestra, was given its premiere performance at the festival. Once again her creative spark was aroused by an accidental sound phenomenon when a large plate fell spinning to the floor.
In 2013 the opera Jorun Snake Eye, to a libretto by Kerstin Ekman, attracted great attention when it was staged at the Vadstena Academy. It is a deeply moving drama, inspired by the women of the Poetic Edda.
During 2015 Marie Samuelsson began working on her Love Trilogy, three orchestral works connected by different themes of love. The opening work, Aphrodite - Fragments by Sappho for mezzo soprano and orchestra, is dedicated to the erotic, sensual love, and was jointly commissioned by the Swedish Radio SO and Gothenburg SO.
The second work, A New Child of Infinity - To My Two Sons, is a clarinet concertino, commissioned by the Malmö SO, and here, the focus is on the love of a child and it’s growing. The third part of the trilogy, The Eros Effect and Solidarity, was inspired by George N. Katsiaficas article 'The Eros Effect', the themes here are solidarity in collective movements and man´s yearning for freedom. It was premiered by the Nordic Chamber Orchestra under Sarah Ioannides, who also brought the piece to the USA and the Tacoma Symphony Orchestra in 2018. The Love Trilogy was recorded and released on CD in March 2019.
Marie Samuelsson has a great engement for environmental issues, which is also
reflected in her music. Five Seasons (2017), for string orchestra and sound file, to poems by Mimmi Palm, was commissiond by Musica Vitae and reflects the climate changes. It was also perfomed during the Baltic Sea Festival. The double concerto The Crane's Beak (2019) for guitar, violin and orchestra, was inspired by a small blue plant whose seeds only germinate when heated, as after a forest fire. The concerto was awarded the Big Christ Johnson Prize in 2023.
In 2021, Marie Samuelsson was given the honorable task of composing a jubillee overture for the Norrland Opera Symphony Orchestra's 30th anniversary, Calls for New Times.
Marie Samuelssons has been awarded a number of prizes for her creation.
2008: Kurt Atterberg prize
2011: The Royal Swedish Academy of Music's Composer Prize in memory of Bo Wallner
2016: The Royal Swedish Academy of Music's Ingvar Lidholms Prize
2023: The Royal Swedish Academy of Music's Big Christ Johnson Prize
Read more about Marie Samuelsson: www.mariesamuelsson.se
(Photo: Mats Bäcker)
