Hvoslef Chamber Works No. Vii

New Norwegian Chamber Music. Composer Ketil Hvoslef. Complete Chamber Works Series, volume 7 of 9. "Trio for Soprano, Alto and Piano" / String Quartet no. III / "Sextet for Flute and Percussion"

What on earth, you may ask, might trombones and string instruments have in common? They do share one property: they are unchallenged among musical instruments in their ability to produce continuous glissandos. String instruments, however, can cover a much larger range than trombones can. In "String Quartet no. III", large glissandos occur, collectively 4 times. In the third of these the gliss. changes direction at the end, presaging the end of the piece: an upward glissando preceded by a quagmire of small simultaneous slides at different speeds and in different directions. Whereas the third string quartet appears to be music of the city, the "Sextet for Flute and Percussion" seems to take place in the jungle. the instrumental forces here are ostensibly right out of balance: a vulnerable flute against five potentially fierce and merciless percussionists. The latter (incarnated as a bass drum quartet and a timpanist) do, in the end, beat the flute into submission, rendering it "voiceless": when the percussion finally recedes, we are left with the rhythmical sound of the flute's keys.