Web comment by the composer:
"
Variations for Orchestra on themes from Dietrich Buxtehude takes its melodic material from Dietrich Buxtehude's organ output, specifically from
the Klag-Lied (BuxWV 76) and
Canzonetta (BuxWV 171). The work was commissioned by the Helsingborg Symphony Orchestra to be premiered in the Helsingborg Concert Hall in November 2007 to 300 -the anniversary of Buxtehude's death in 1707. He worked for a few years as organist in St. Mary's Church in Helsingborg in the middle of the 17th century
, and therefore it was natural that his organ music was the basis for my thematic choice themes where I varied the music in different ways through instrumentation, harmonizations, fugues and other techniques and the result is music written with a twinkle in my eye where different parts tumble into each other and instrument groups are exposed opposite each other
. appears several times and also ends the work, all the time with the English horn as the mournfully melodic instrument of the beautiful theme. In the closing bars, the music disappears into a fog where the accompanying instruments stop playing one by one and finally, when the melody has died out, only a broad icy string chord remains, a chord that has stealthily established itself in the piece."
Rolf Martinsson Sound samples:
Helsingborg Symphony Orchestra, conductor. John Axelrod
(live recording)
