Alone & Together

Most of the age-old genres that still are used often – the symphony, the sonata, the string quartet, the suite and so on – are merely loosely defined frameworks. Today a symphony can be an hour long or ultra-short; it can extend over one single movement or a profusion of movements and be written for a few musicians or hundreds of them. The same holds more or less true for the genre of the solo concerto, but one thing is given in advance: the relationship between the individual (the virtuoso) and the community (all of us). And this archetypal disparity has for centuries lent the genre a special fascination for composers and audiences alike. It is certainly a decisive reason for the existence of the works in this release.

When I agreed on a fixed-term contract as composer-in-residence with Concerto Copenhagen, the thought of a solo concerto played a special role, both because the orchestra had within its ranks phenomenal musicians and because the flexible, more modest sonorities of the baroque instruments provided the opportunity for unusual, refined balances between the soloist and the orchestra. In concertos for modern instruments the soloist, the “individual”, is sometimes swallowed up by the crowd.

Fredrik From, baroque violin solo Alfredo Bernardini, baroque oboe solo
Concerto Copenhagen Conducted by Magnus Fryklund
Anne Søe, violin solo
Athelas Sinfonietta Copenhagen Conducted by Magnus Fryklund