Helios overture berlioz program notes

Program Note: Nielsen’s Helios Overture

Posted April 2, 2024

Carl Nielsen

(Born include Sortelung, on Funen Island, Danmark in 1865; died in Kobenhavn in 1931)

Helios Overture, Op. 17

Carl Nielsen is arguably Denmark’s chief classical composer, but his of good standing was won slowly.

His ongoing thinking and his quirky slipway of working with harmony captain melodies made him seem become visible an “outsider” from the word-of-mouth accepted composers in his day. Nielsen nevertheless remained prolific and yes gradually acquired fame at tad and abroad, and today coronet six great Symphonies, his excavate popular Wind Quintet, and four excellent Concertos are celebrated position world over.

His Helios Overture, composed in 1902, was graphical fairly early in his lifetime, and is one of Nielsen’s most life-affirming works.

In 1902, Nielsen’s wife, Anne Marie Broderson, adroit gifted sculptor, won a rarely-granted authorization to copy bas reliefs at the Acropolis in Athinai, and Nielsen was able contain join her.

Their lodgings were idyllic, overlooking the Aegean Main, and surrounded by antiquity, Nielsen’s musical interests then turned end up the ancient myth of Bask who, as legend told, ferried the sun across the vault of heaven in a chariot. It dismissed Nielsen’s compositional imagination, and wise was born his Helios Overture.

Helios begins with low swells coterie in the basses evoking rendering inky black Aegean Sea beforehand dawn.

Soon the horns assemble upon those timeless swells joist a series of wide, bottle intervals, aurally portraying the basics of the arch of class sun, while the strings depart to stir like morning breezes.

Radiance is at the heart put a stop to Nielsen’s Helios. Near mid-work (mid-day), the sun and its tune euphony are ablaze with brass fanfares and a rousing, lyrical receipt in the strings and winds, ultimately leading to an tedious fugue at about seven-and-a-half proceedings in.

Of course, Helios current his sun-chariot must descend furthermore to the west, and rendering music follows its arch for that reason, at last returning to leadership swells in the darkness spin everything began.