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Hagall

for nine players

Jeffrey Holmes

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£34.99£185.99

for nine players

£54.99
£34.99
£185.99
£120.99
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Composer Jeffrey Holmes
Year of Composition 2015
Duration ca.21'
Forces fl/picc, ob/ca, cbcl/pic-eflat.cl, hn, perc, vln, vla, vc, db
Categories (all composers)
Catalogue ID ce-jh1h1

Notes

The title “Hagall” comes from the Old-Norse Runic symbol for hail (as in hailstorm). “Hagall” is the first of the “Winter” runes, implying a not yet fully-frozen landscape, but instead a period of transition and struggle. The individual runic symbol is accompanied by an ancient elemental poem in three parts, which creates the large-scale structure of the piece:

Cold Grain (Earth),
Shower of Sleet (Sky),
Sickness of Serpents (Sea).

There are several references to “primordial” instruments, including: the contra-bass clarinet imitating a Nordic lure, the French and English horns imitating primitive cow horns, non-pitched percussion instruments, various “non-octave” scales and complex compound-rhythms, and a variety of microtonalities including several uses of the overtone series.

Hagall is an expressive and dramatic representation of a turbulent Scandinavian winter storm set in one large mythical arc, comprised of constantly varied landscapes of intense moods and esoteric images, creating an epic journey of death.