Cantabile

Cantabile, a Concerto for Viola and Orchestra, was composed in 2019 to a commission from the Musikkollegium Winterthur and is dedicated to the violist Jürg Dähler. Its first performance took place on 7 May 2020 in the Winterthur City Hall, with Jürg Dähler as soloist, accompanied by the Musikkollegium Winterthur conducted by the composer.

Cantabile, a Concerto for Viola and Orchestra, is an extensive work that makes use of many of the virtues and clichés of the viola (leisureliness, melancholy, gloominess etc.), but that also refutes them by employing breakneck virtuosity and a vast range, into the very highest registers. The basic lyrical idea behind the work is constantly chipped away, suppressed and ultimately recaptured in well-nigh excessive fashion.

Despite the chamber music treatment of the orchestra, Cantabile also has many tutti passages, though their orchestration and dynamics mean that these also come across as intimate. The harmonies move between chromaticism, quarter-tones and the overtone spectrum with even smaller micro-intervals. In addition to the solo viola and the orchestra on the podium, four horns are employed that are positioned in the hall and can be heard from different directions as a kind of echo chamber.

Instruments: Vla Solo-1.Picc.1.Ca.1.B-cl.1.Cbsn-4.0.0.0-2Perc-Str