The Performance
Bartók X Björk is an exploration of the avant-garde and adventurous, synthesizing the music of two of the 20th century’s most ingenious musicians. Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra is fused with the music of Björk, selected from her first three albums: Debut, Post, and Homogenic. These two composers from different genres are beloved for similar reasons: their radical and colorful musical language, extremes of emotional expression, and thrilling modernism. Underscoring the fusion are the parallels between the narrative context of Bartók’s Concerto and the subjects of Björk’s songs; the ominous threats of war in the first movement with “Army of Me,” the second movement’s playful “Presentation of the Couples” with Björk’s “Human Behavior,” the heart-wrenching third movement Elegy with “All is Full of Love” and “Hyperballad,” the ambivalence of the Finale’s conclusion with “Play Dead,” and the exoticism of the folk melodies throughout the piece with “Hunter.” Three virtuoso female solo vocalists join the full orchestra.
