Opening concert (Sold out)

Kanonhallen 
10/9, 19.00 
150/250 NOK

George Lewis
Tine Thing Helseth – trumpet  
Ensemble Allegria 
Det Norske Solistkor 
Grete Pedersen – conductor
Moo Gyung Kim – dancer

George Lewis: Opening speech (video)

Brigitta Muntendorf & Stephanie Thiersch: Research Into the Archipelago (2020, WP)
Det Norske Solistkor, dancer, multichannel electronics 

Ørjan Matre: Trompeten, Nachts und Untergang (2020, WP) 
Tine Thing Helseth – trumpet  
Det Norske Solistkor

- intermission -

Nils Henrik Asheim: Muohta (2017)
Det Norske Solistkor & Ensemble Allegria  

OEIN, La Paz & PHØNIX16, Berlin & Philipp Hartmann, Hamburg: From the 84 Days (2020, WP) 
Short film version

Ultima 2020 launches this year’s festival in the storm of cultural, financial and political unrest triggered by the coronavirus. Many festivals, Ultima included, have been forced to rethink and re-evaluate their presentations and programme, and find new ways to include audiences and international artists. From a work interrupted by the crisis to the plight of people stranded thousands of miles from home, Ultima’s inaugural event is shaped by the uncontrollable forces that have affected the entire planet, and offer some reflections on how the creative imagination is facing up to new realities.

We’ll be joined on video from New York by the renowned composer, improviser and academic George Lewis in an opening speech that will post questions about the future of music in the crisis landscapes left behind after COVID-19 and the Black Lives Matter protests.

Research Into the Archipelago offers glimpses of a large scale interdisciplinary work that was originally scheduled for the opening of Ultima this year with Det Norske Solistkor, musicians, dancers and sculptural architecture

Instead of presenting the full Archipelago, German-Austrian composer Brigitta Muntendorf and choreographer Stephanie Thiersch unveil two experimental segments of what will evolve into a monumental movement/sonic/sculptural performance on a spectacular stage construction by architect Sou Fujimoto. The work is an exploration of archaic biological processes that challenge our perception, and the excerpts shown tonight will point towards the full work to be presented at Ultima in 2021.

Trompeten, Nachts und Untergang – Ørjan Matre’s new concerto for solo trumpet and choir written for the young Norwegian star trumpeter Tine Thing Helseth and Det Norske Solistkor – features three texts by the Austrian expressionist poet George Trakl. Distant trumpets, crumbling castles and frozen lakes are interpreted musically in a tonal language that reeks of German late romanticism.

Nils Henrik Asheim’s Muohta consists of 18 different Sami words for ‘snow’. The music moves through a serene white landscape undergoing slow, imperceptible changes. In the context of the climate crisis, and with fresh memories of this summer’s heatwave above Norway’s Arctic Circle, it’s a powerful reminder that the beauty of snow may one day be only a memory. Muohta is one of three works on a new CD with Det Norske Solistkor that was just released on BIS.

In March this year, 25 musicians from the Bolivian Experimental Orchestra for Indigenous Instruments (OEIN) arrived in Germany to play some concerts. In the corona pandemic their events were cancelled and they found themselves stranded for three months at the Rheinsberg Castle outside Berlin. German director Philip Hartmann documented their situation and the resulting movie, From the 84 Days – screened for the first time at Ultima – tells the remarkable inside story of the musicianship and their strategies for surviving this period of limbo.

In collaboration with Det Norske Solistkor

From the 84 days:  Produced by flumenfilm, PHØNIX16, OEIN Experimental de Instrumentos Nativos in collaraboration with and support from DAAD Berliner Künstlerprogramm and Ultima
Direction, photography, editing, voice-over: Philipp Hartmann
Dramaturgy: Timo Kreuser & Philipp Hartmann
Sound recording and mix: Alexis Baskind