October 27th, 2007
I work primarily with people, not with instruments or paper, says composer Therese Birkelund Ulvo. She composes in intimate dialogue with performers and focuses on how this exchange of ideas with other musicians can supplement the written score. Her music is also inspired by other art fields,such as film, text and sound art.
Ulvo’s music moves in the intersection between the acoustic and electronic, both realms reciprocally coloured by the other. The compositions often arise out of various forms of friction, noise and overtones created by the instruments.
The compositional forms seem to appear as open, sometimes bordering on the improvised, while still maintaining a strong narrative aspect. This openness allows both performers and listeners the freedom to shape the music. On one level, the composer gives up control, but in return she gain presence and a direct, almost tactile contact with the listener.
Therese Birkelund Ulvo (born 1982) studied composition at the Norwegian Academy of Music and Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London. She also has a tight bond to Norwegian traditional music, a genre that has a rich array of micro-tonal and rhapsodic passages, open forms and performer-based compositions.
Ulvo has written music for a wide range of ensembles. In Ensemble Epoch, which consists of Britt Pernille Frøholm on Hardanger fiddle and Ulvo on electronics, she also experiments with the space surrounding the listening experience. The duo has performed in a variety of settings including open air events and club performances, leaving the performers in a closer and more committing encounter with the listener than in larger concert halls.
Text: Hilde Borchgrevinck Translation: Tomas Lauvland Pettersen
I work primarily with people, not with instruments or paper, says composer Therese Birkelund Ulvo. She composes in intimate dialogue with performers and focuses on how this exchange of ideas with other musicians can supplement the written score. Her music is also inspired by other art fields,such as film, text and sound art.
Ulvo’s music moves in the intersection between the acoustic and electronic, both realms reciprocally coloured by the other. The compositions often arise out of various forms of friction, noise and overtones created by the instruments.
The compositional forms seem to appear as open, sometimes bordering on the improvised, while still maintaining a strong narrative aspect. This openness allows both performers and listeners the freedom to shape the music. On one level, the composer gives up control, but in return she gain presence and a direct, almost tactile contact with the listener.
Therese Birkelund Ulvo (born 1982) studied composition at the Norwegian Academy of Music and Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London. She also has a tight bond to Norwegian traditional music, a genre that has a rich array of micro-tonal and rhapsodic passages, open forms and performer-based compositions.
Ulvo has written music for a wide range of ensembles. In Ensemble Epoch, which consists of Britt Pernille Frøholm on Hardanger fiddle and Ulvo on electronics, she also experiments with the space surrounding the listening experience. The duo has performed in a variety of settings including open air events and club performances, leaving the performers in a closer and more committing encounter with the listener than in larger concert halls.
Text: Hilde Borchgrevinck Translation: Tomas Lauvland Pettersen
Merits
Therese Birkelund Ulvo rapidly made a name for herself as an original and exciting artist, after her breakthrough as a composer at the Ultima Festival in Oslo in 2007, with the piece Fragile for the Hardange fiddle player Pernille Frøholm. The close cooperation between composer the musician in this piece resulted in the establishment of Ensemble Epoché.
From 2008 on, Ulvo With this ensemble visited festivals like the Young Nordic Music Festival, International Church Music Festival in Kristiansand, Folkelarm, and the concert series Bidribon at Biermansgården in Oslo. In the beginning of 2009, the installation Simple/New/Norwegian/Music/Machine, made in cooperation with Jørgen Karlstrøm, was exhibited in Bergen and Oslo.
In August 2009 her work Silent Song I was presented at the Festival of Silence outside Oslo. She was the festival composer at the Literature Festival at Lillehammer 2009. Ulvo has also composed film music, such as Watching (2004) which was bestowed with the Jim Poole Scottish Short Film Award 2005, and the Norwegian documentary Kjærlighetens valg (2009), which has been awarded a number of prizes.
contact:
therese(at)theresebirkelund.com
