October 17 | 19:00
The Energy and Technology Museum
RESONANCES OF POETICS
Ensemble for New Music Tallinn (Estonia)
“Ensemble for New Music Tallinn” – one of the leading contemporary music ensembles in the Baltic and Nordic region – will present an impressive programme to the audience of the Music Autumn festival.
In this programme, “Ensemble for New Music Tallinn” explores how poetic text and language itself become objects of creative analysis. The works investigate how the rhythm of language, the diversity of translations, and their semantic contrasts, as well as the overtones of Estonian formants, transform into musical material, where language becomes music and poetry turns into compositional substance. In this way, the original field of meaning is expanded or even transformed, granting it new vitality and dimensions of experience.
This concert is organised in collaboration with the “Baltic Music Days” festival and its organisers, the Baltic Contemporary Music Network.
Concert program
“This is. And thou art. There is no safety. There is no end. The word must be heard in silence. There must be darkness to see the stars. The dance is always danced above the hollow place, above the terrible abyss.”
Ursula K. LeGuin, “The Farthest Shore”
„The starting point for the piece “Blumenmuskel “is a striking poem by Rainer Maria Rilke, along with its numerous translations and the different perspectives these interpretations create. The poem I am referring to is the fifth in the second part of his masterpiece “The Sonnets to Orpheus”, a cycle of 55 sonnets written in 1922.
Widely recognized as one of the most lyrically intense German-language poets, Rilke was unique in his efforts to expand the realm of poetry through new uses of syntax and imagery, as well as through the philosophy that his poems explored.
I am quite sure that my first encounters with Rilke’s writings came through translations into Latvian. It also turns out that Rilke is one of the most translated German-language poets in the world. If we look only at “The Sonnets to Orpheus”, in English alone, there are dozens of complete translations of the cycle, not even counting partial selections.
It is absolutely fascinating to see how the same text - especially poetry so closely tied to its original language, extra-linguistic references, and culture-specific contexts - can be read, understood, interpreted, and perceived through different translations.
This is the “territory” where my piece begins. After some research, I came across more than 30 English translations of the same poem, beginning with the words “Blumenmuskel, der der Anemone…” Created by people living in different countries, eras, political situations, and cultural contexts, these translations are highly diverse. A few attempt to replicate Rilke’s rhyme scheme, while others are freer in that respect; some focus more on the poetic essence, while others almost become new original works of art in their own right.
Out of this collection, I decided to choose five translations, based on their strength, their contrasts with one another, and their distance from or closeness to the original poem. Each of these five translations, together with Rilke’s original poem, became the basis for an individual part of the piece. Taken as a whole, the composition can be seen as the same story told from strikingly different perspectives.”
Santa Bušs
Rainer Maria Rilke
Blumenmuskel, der der Anemone
Wiesenmorgen nach und nach erschließt,
bis in ihren Schooß das polyphone
Licht der lauten Himmel sich ergießt,
in den stillen Blütenstern gespannter
Muskel des unendlichen Empfangs,
manchmal so von Fülle übermannter,
daß der Ruhewink des Untergangs
kaum vermag die weitzurückgeschnellten
Blätterränder dir zurückzugeben:
du, Entschluß und Kraft von wieviel Welten!
Wir, Gewaltsamen, wir währen länger.
Aber wann, in welchem aller Leben,
sind wir endlich offen und Empfänger?
„The Jangling Lightness of Solace” draws on two sources of inspiration. First, the expressive and technical possibilities of the piccolo, explored in close collaboration with flautist and dear friend Maria Jönsson.
Second, the poetry of Fernando Pessoa:
“Look, the light is glowing / upon the mountaintop... / Aimlessly I ponder upon I know not what... / … / Now upon the mountain the light begins to fade… / As in a rushing river, / my soul in it is bathed, / but it does not soothe me, / nor ease my deep dismay… / Oh, poor little wandering child / Lost along the way!…”
Liisa Hõbepappel
Justina Repečkaitė
Millefleur
(2025, premiere)
Comission by LRT.
In medieval European tapestries, the term “millefleur” (French for “a thousand flowers”) refers to a decorative, stylized, and symbolic surface filled with numerous small flowers, plants, and animals, often depicted at inconsistent scales and without an actual landscape or perspective.
For Justina Repečkaitė, as a composer, “millefleur” in music similarly suggests a variety of short motifs and timbral colors. Subtly changing yet arranged within a unified decorative surface, they do not create hierarchy but emphasize shifting details and viewpoints. In the score, the piano part features its own arpeggio-like figures, providing a foundation for the ensemble’s motifs to develop and intensify until saturation.
“Millefleur” is part of J. Repečkaitė’s cycle of ensemble compositions inspired by weaving techniques. “Ensemble for New Music Tallinn” has already recorded composer’s piece "Tapisserie" (2015) for her upcoming album "Tapestries," soon to be released via the Music Information Centre Lithuania.
“All the instrumental material in this piece is derived from a poem written in 1910 by the Estonian writer Juhan Liiv. Only later did I discover that, at the time of writing, Liiv had already been suffering from schizophrenia for several years—yet he continued to produce some of his most beautiful and profound works, including this luminous text.
At first, I approached the poem through a rather analytical lens. I began by analyzing the spectral content of Estonian syllables, extracting rhythms, overtones, and coarticulations. The structure of the work follows this process: from vowel-based overtone chords to verse-derived harmony and rhythm, and finally to melodies shaped by the contours of speech.
By working in this way, I believe the text revealed yet another layer of both lightness and darkness embedded in the language Liiv chose. With a wealth of material generated from this analysis, I sought to shape a form that would be sensitive both to the meaning of the text and to its overtone fabric.
The final section is a multilayered composition of pre-recorded voices—some of which seemed to haunt me during the creation of this work.”
Liisa Hirsch
Performers
Ensemble for New Music Tallinn
Ensemble for New Music Tallinn (ENMT), founded in 2012, is today one of the leading voices of contemporary music in the Baltic and Nordic region. Known for its focus on alternative intonation systems and microtonality, the ensemble has become a specialist in exploring new sound worlds beyond traditional tuning. Its modular line-up combines core musicians with guest artists, enabling a flexible repertoire of over a hundred works, many of them commissioned or specially written for ENMT.
The ensemble has premiered works by Georg Friedrich Haas, Klaus Lang, Helena Tulve, Marc Sabat, Arash Yazdani and many others, and has appeared at major festivals including Warsaw Autumn, Ostrava Days, Musikprotokoll Graz, ISCM World Music Days, Baltic Music Days and AFEKT. Since 2017, ENMT also curates the Sound Plasma Festival in Berlin and Tallinn, dedicated to alternative intonation and experimental music.
Kiti festivalio renginiai
Lapkričio 16 d. 19 val.
Lietuvos kompozitorių sąjunga
Lapkričio 16 d. 19 val.
Lietuvos kompozitorių sąjunga
Lapkričio 16 d. 19 val.
Lietuvos kompozitorių sąjunga
Lapkričio 16 d. 19 val.
Lietuvos kompozitorių sąjunga
Lapkričio 16 d. 19 val.
Lietuvos kompozitorių sąjunga
Lapkričio 16 d. 19 val.
Lietuvos kompozitorių sąjunga
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