Clarinet Concerto: Verdure eng

Program notes:

Verdure comes from the latin word viridis and means ”the fresh green colour of lush vegetation”.

That my first solo concerto became in fact a clarinet concerto is because of my many prior chamber music collaborations with the clarinetist Stefan Harg. Now I wanted to compose a concerto for him.

As often before the impulse for the composition came from something visual. In this case the color green. In an earlier piece Colors for wind quintet I used the colors blue, red and yellow. Now the time had come for green.

Green a result of the photosynthesis, the color of the beginning of life in the form of chlorophyll. Therefor the concerto also is about the force of life.

Within the color theory the color is considered calm and harmonic. In the nature it ranges from light, fresh, intensive, lively to complete and lush, uniform, shimmering grayish dry, dark and heavy.

The agility of the clarinet is well fitted to play all these different nuances.

The first movement contains drama and lamentation as well as lively intensity and power.

The second movement is casted in a darker nuance. The air is shimmering with humid warmth - could be night time in a rain forest. Here are two solo cadenzas, one shorter and the other more substantial with a playful clarinet trilling away. The last part of the second movement is sweeping, light and warm.

Third movement is playful, energetic and rhythmical. Sparsely orchestrated in bright colors. Here there’s also a solo cadenza before the orchestra takes over.

Clarinet Concerto: Verdure

for Symphony Orchestra