noslīka

Programme note

Kur, Saulīte, mājas ņēmi Vakarāi noiedama? — Vidū jūras, uz ūdeņa, Zelta niedres galiņā. Sper, Pērkon, kur sperdams, Sper avota dibenā; Tur noslīka Saules meita, Zelta kannas mazgādama.

When is the last time that you watched a sunset without doing anything, really anything else?

Asking myself this question is what led to the time-structure of this piece. I’m interested in the connection of real-life time with musical time. I got curious about how the few minutes it takes the sun to set under the horizon can be the basis of a few-minute composition.

Two Latvian folk texts, both written about the shared picture of a sunset on the waters. They are placed mirroring each other, one bright, the other dark. The title noslīka means drowned as in ‘sun-daughter drowned there’.

The social milieu these texts come from had a very different relationship to elements than we do today in our everyday life. The speed of their everyday life was surely different from ours. I want to write music that helps us connect to elemental feelings, moods, experiences the way that a sunset does.