Snap Music

Programme Note by the Composer

The piece is inspired by the English word 'snap' and its close to 90 meanings when translated into Finnish language – to crack, to click, to bounce, to flash, to slam... The musical material, gestures and characters of the work are evolved from these, right down to the details.

"And then I just snapped."

In terms of dramaturgy and emotion, the piece follows the psychological concept of 'snapping', i.e. psychologically losing control of oneself. A series of events in which gradually accumulated emotions have developed into a chaos of the mind finally culminates in complete loss of control. What happens when the sense of control vanishes and all that remains is dizzy emptiness?

Although the underlying idea behind the piece is the psychological, long-span process and forward motion, there are also episodes based on the idea of 'snaps' in the sense of musical extracts. These manifest as types of textures made up of short extracts following one another in a flashing manner while creating abrupt musical cuts.

My aim in the orchestration was to utilize the wide-ranging potential of the orchestra fully. The sonorities vary from rich and expansive to small and delicate; there are both dense, multilayered textures taking use of the full orchestra and comments or solos by individual instruments and small groups. The orchestra goes through a journey of its own, the instrumentation reflecting the underlying emotional process of snapping – emotions that vary from, e.g. light to heavy, control to the lack thereof, and emptiness to chaos.

- Sebastian Hilli