The smashing closing of the Lera Auerbach Festival! Trio for violin, horn and piano seems to end with a dazzling third movement, but then Lera Auerbach surprises with a closing adagio, a masterpiece of weightlessness. Auerbach began writing the Seraphim Canticles in her temporary home after her New York apartment was destroyed by fire in the fall of 2009. Seraphim are biblical angels, terrifying, flaming and with six wings (sextet). Lera Auerbach: ‘This is a very personal work. It is an intense prayer, perhaps an unrelenting look at despair.’
After the intermission we present the Dutch premiere of Gallow Songs, imaginative songs for saxophone quartet and women’s choir. These songs are inspired by Galgenlieder (1905), a collection of whimsical, ambiguous and humorous verses by the German poet Christian Morgenstern. ‘In interpretation one must certainly exaggerate. The listener may be surprised, delighted or irritated, but never bored,’ says Lera Auerbach.
The songs are followed by a new composition by Uruguayan-Spanish composer, guitarist and sound designer Guzmán Calzada Llorente, composer in residence of Festival Dag in de Branding.