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Programme Note

Pelle Gudmundsen-Holmgreen reTURNING (1987)

When Lerchenborg Music Days commissioned a work by me for the Japanese ensemble SOUND SPACE ARK I was at once aware that I would express my gratitude for having met or sensed the cultural aura of this country: the monastery gardens, Gagaku, the Haiku poems, Zen. During the work on reTurning the following fundamental concepts came to my mind: Simplicity, clarity, precision, identity, clash, short circuit, repetition, transformation, - and parting and evening (lullaby, ringing of bells).
The title reTurning refers to two things: reappearance and turning. Physically a long and slow journey is taking place on the stage, the music moves from one side to the other. From one group of instruments to another, the flute starting, the piano ending. From one landscape of sound to another.
As a motto of the work I have used the well-known Haiku:
The temple bell dies away
The scent of flowers in the evening
Is still tolling the bell.

Pelle Gudmundsen-Holmgreen (2002)