IVAR FROUNBERG writer/Shorter Texts/030220

TRANS-IT

Det. Det var det. Så er det begyndt. Det er. (It. It was it. Now it is begun. It is. – the danish poet Inger Christensen)

The definitive ’it’ dosn’t exist for the artist. It may exist for a while, as a temporary goal. But as time passes the goal has to be moved ahead. The artist - the composer - is always creating new terrain, new spaces, new thoughts, and is always brought closer to his goal.

The duplicate, a replica, is of no importance. So ’trans’ is penetrating ’it’ when the composer moves into new territories of expression. At this point the goal is to close and threatens to stop the possible movement into the future.

…to arrive where we started is such a first sight of a new terrain opened up again by the death of Morton Feldman. For the first time for years I could return to some ideas I had to abandon when, and after I studied with Morty. I didn’t want to be a epigon, so I had to investigate other territories of interest to me. The sad experience of a beloved teachers death brought me freedom. There is no reason to be sentimental about that. I returned at my startingpoint, but this time I carried a luggage: my experiences in the interim. The return became an arrival.

The arts does not allow the artist to express himself undisturbed: he must transcend his limitations. My uncomfortableness with singers and text made me produce an abstract text with no meaning. But a simple vocalise wasn’t my solution. I invented an imaginary language. Paradoxically this invented ’language’ contains an autobiographically element. Luckily persons, I feared would have noticed, did not!

It was a transition into a new landscape: unexpected for the composer the form of the piece became a dramaturgical confrontation of two states. Both are contemplative, but their confrontation is a dramatic clash giving rise to new formal elements: a prelude and an open-form coda: the extended ending!

The same experience was experienced when I accepted a professorate in composition i Oslo. Becoming a new cirtizen in Norway - which has a dramatically different landscape - made me reflect on my own history of transition: my great-grandfather immigrated from Germany to Denmark a little less than150 years ago. And now I myself experience the newness and freshness of being a newcomer to another culture. It strikes me, that I – as a third generation immigrant - never became rooted in the country I was born.

Now – again – it has begun. New mountains must be conquered, new seascapes experienced. New music must be written. Yet again the esthetics has to be questioned: in this country of steap ’fjell’s, ’skær’ (under-the-surface rocks, dangerous when driving the boat) and winterdarkness as well as summer-madness when the sun not really settles – in such a country I expect to transcend once again. Trans it!