Per Nørgård (b. July 13, 1932 in Gentofte, Denmark) is one of the most important Danish composers of the twentieth century. Julian Anderson considers Danish composer Nørgård's Voyage into the Golden Screen for chamber orchestra to be the first "properly instrumental piece of spectral composition."[1]
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Biography
Nørgård studied with Vagn Holmboe at the Royal Danish Academy of Music in Copenhagen, and subsequently with Nadia Boulanger in Paris. To begin with, he was strongly influenced by the Nordic styles of Jean Sibelius, Carl Nielsen and Vagn Holmboe. In the 1960s, Nørgård began exploring the modernist techniques of central Europe, eventually developing a serial compositional system based on the "infinity series",[2] which he used in his Voyage into the Golden Screen, 2nd and 3rd symphonies, and many of his other works of the late 1960s and 70s. Later he became interested in the Swiss artist Adolf Wölfli, who inspired many of Nørgård's works, including the 4th symphony, the opera Det Guddommelige Tivoli and Papalagi for solo guitar. Nørgård has composed works in all major genres: six operas, two ballets, seven symphonies and other pieces for orchestra, several concertos, choral and vocal works, an enormous number of chamber works, ten string quartets and several solo instrumental works. These include a number of works for the guitar, mostly written for the Danish guitarist Erling Møldrup: In Memory Of... (1978), Papalagi (1981), a series of suites called Tales from a Hand (1985-2001), Early Morn (1997-98) and Rondino Amorino (1999). One of his most important works for percussion solo is I Ching (1982) for the Danish percussionist Gert Mortensen. He has also composed music for several films, including The Red Cloak (1966), Babette's Feast (1987), and Hamlet, Prince of Denmark (1993). Nørgård is also a prolific writer. He has written many articles dealing with music not only from a technical but also a philosophical viewpoint. His thoughts on music philosophy are among the best documented of any composer.
Music
Nørgård's often features the use of the infinity series (Danish Uendelighedsrækken) for serializing melody, harmony, and rhythm in musical composition. The method takes its name from the endlessly self-similar nature of the resulting musical material, comparable to fractal geometry. Nørgård discovered the melodic infinity series in 1959 and it proved an inspiration for many of his works during the 1960s. However, it was not until his Voyage into the Golden Screen for small ensemble (1968) and Symphony No. 2 (1970) that it provided the structure for an entire work (Nørgård 1975, 9). The harmonic and rhythmic infinity series were developed in the early 1970s and the three series were first integrated in Nørgård's Symphony No. 3.
Works
Symphonic
- Symphony No. 1 Sinfonia austera (1953-55)
- Symphony No. 2 (1970)
- Symphony No. 3 (1972-75)
- Symphony No. 4 (1981)
- Symphony No. 5 (1990)
- Symphony No. 6 At the End of the Day (1998-99)
- Symphony No. 7 (2006)
Concerti
- Violin concerto Helle Nacht (1986-87)
- Piano concerto Concerto in due tempi (1994-95)
Selected other works
- Trio No. 1 (1955)
- Konstellationer (Constellations) (1958)
- Voyage into the Golden Screen (1968)
- Libra (1973)
- Turn (1973)
- Siddharta (1974-79)
- Wie ein Kind (Like a Child) (1979-80)
- Drømmesange (Dream Songs) (1981)
- I Ching (1982)
- Najader (The Naiads) (1986)
Awards
- Sonning Award (1996; Denmark)
Sources
- Anderson, Julian. 2000. "A Provisional History of Spectral Music." Contemporary Music Review 19, no. 2 ("Spectral Music History and Techniques", edited by Joshua Fineberg): 7–22.
- Nørgård, Per. 1975. "Inside a Symphony". Translated by L. K. Christensen. Numus-West 2, no. 2:4–16.
Footnotes
External links
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