related works
Movements : Two sketches for symphony orchestra / Kris Oelbrandt
Genre:
Orchestra
Subgenre:
Orchestra
Scoring:
3fl 2ob eh 3cl cl-b 2fg cfg 4h 3trp 2trb timp 2perc hp str
Genre:
Chamber music
Subgenre:
Oboe; Electronics with different instruments; Oboe with multimedia
Scoring:
ob electronics
Xenolith : for cor anglais, 1994 / Christina Oorebeek
Genre:
Chamber music
Subgenre:
Oboe
Scoring:
eh
Mu : voor hobo, 1986 / Huub Kerstens
Genre:
Chamber music
Subgenre:
Oboe
Scoring:
ob
composition
Micrologica 10-12 (It's Pointless!) : for oboe / Kris Oelbrandt
Author(s):
Oelbrandt, Kris
(Composer)
Description:
A solo oboe whose sounds float intangibly, elusively in thin air. When the Dominican Church Zwolle commissioned me to compose this piece, I thought immediately of Ecclesiastes 1:2: "All is vain and pointless." And yet that is exactly what makes life so beautiful: we have no control over it. That's good. Once we accept this fact, we feel the core of our existence anew. It is the paradox of our life: everything is indeed intangible, and it is precisely in this intangibility that we find the anchor point, the core of our life. That is why these oboe pieces are very consistently composed around a fixed point: every musical cell either departs from this point, or returns to it. That fixed point gives space and direction for the oboe to float seemingly elusively in space.
These pieces are part of my Micrologica cycle. A "Micrologica" is a miniature in which a logical music-theoretic principle is implemented very tightly and consistently. It is an exercise in compositional asceticism, for no creative digression is allowed. Precisely this asceticism proves to be formative and fruitful for my composing technique. It is precisely through this exercise in
compositional abstinence that I find new freedoms.
Kris Oelbrandt