The Norwegian composer Olav Anton Thommessen's work A Glass Bead Game, which won the Nordic Council's Music Prize in 1990, was performed in its entirety for the first time during the Bergen Festival this year. The world premiere of the complete A Glass Bead Game concludes the series "A century of or own - Norwegian orchestral music 1905-2005" in Norwegian concert halls.
By Anders Beyer
“I HAVE YOUR headline! It should be “Vulgarity conquers the concert hall”, says an ebullient Olav Anton Thommessen (b. 1946) to your correspondent immediately after a whole evening’s performance of all six parts of A Glass Bead Game: 1. Prologue, 2. Macrofantasy for piano and orchestra, 3. Beyond Neon, concert for horn and orchestra, 4. Choral symphony over Beethoven’s Eighth, 5. Through a Prism, concerto for cello, organ and orchestra, 6. Encore over Verdi’s Dies Irae – Apotheosis.
It was the sixth part of Thommessen’s magnum opus, Through a Prism, that received the Nordic Council’s Music Prize in 1990. Thommessen says to Nordic Sounds that it has been hard for him that the music has not been performed. He had to get on with his development as a composer despite the fact that he had not been able to hear important parts of his output played. In 1990 the jury said about the prizewinning work:
“Gennem prisme reflects the times in which we live. The composer doesn’t seek comfort in pre-established structures or in a homogenous tonal language. Impressions from various musical cultures and epochs form the basic material, which is transformed to form a synthesis.”
The whole of A Glass Bead Game was finally premiered by the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra and the Bergen Philharmonic Choir conducted by Ingar Bergby in the Grieg Hall on 4th June 2005. The composer describes the work as “a whole-evening orchestral production” and “a concert opera”. The unusually spectacular composition in Wagnerian format takes its title from Hermann Hesse’s novel The Glass Bead Game. With his work Thommessen refers to an overall theme of Hesse’s novel: the issue of the role of the artist vis-àvis society, This ‘ivory tower issue’ has also affected the composer Thommessen; A Glass Bead Game can thus be seen as an attempt to make art music more accessible without compromising on internal consistency and cohesion.
The six parts of Thommessen’s work can be performed separately, but they were conceived as one continuous whole. Perhaps a little like Stockhausen’s heptalogy Licht with seven operas for the days of the week: they can also be performed individually, but the composer sees them as one unified work with spiritual affinities with Wagner’s Ring cycle.
Apotheosis
Olav Anton Thommessen is considered one of the most important Norwegian composers and he has received commissions from all the major Norwegian orchestras and festivals as well as institutions abroad. His great knowledge of musical history and film music has made him a much sought-after teacher, lecturer and the subject of numerous interviews.
He holds a professorship in composition at the Norwegian State Academy of Music. His output comprises compositions for orchestra and chamber ensembles, as well as music drama.
At the beginning of the 1980s Thommessen – who was greatly preoccupied with the dissemination of music – began using quotations from the music of earlier times as the starting-point for his own works. It is in this tradition that A Glass Bead Game should be viewed. Thommessen saw a need to supplement his strongly modernist side with music that could communicate with a wider audience. He has said of the piano concerto Macrofantasy that by starting the concerto with elements from Grieg’s concerto, then going over to his own material, he is really building on a well known pedagogical idea – from the known to the unknown. The prologue from 1979 has the subtitle “Pedagogical overture” – it is a short piece where elements of sound are added on in a layered structure. We hear fragments from Händel’s Water Music. In Macrofantasy (1980) material from Grieg’s piano concerto is used before it is combined with Thommessen’s own material, which takes over the soundscape. Beyond Neon from 1981 is a horn concerto with the subtitle “Postcommercial sound sculptures”.
After an interval in the programme comes Choral Symphony (1979) for choir and orchestra, which is based on a theme from Beethoven’s Eighth Symphony. The next part, Through a Prism, is a double concerto for cello, organ and orchestra. It all ends with the encore, where the composer plays further with Verdi’s Dies Irae from the Requiem.
At a debate meeting arranged by the Norwegian Association of Critics Thommessen was asked whether he now thought, after hearing the whole work unified in a live performance, that the work ‘stood up’ – whether it was a good work. The answer from the Norwegian artist was as precise as it was short: He replied: “Yes!”.