Fourth Symphony
1st movement
Development of the music
Birdsong, distorted popular songs and a Swiss mountain melody are not the only 'objets trouvés' that Nørgård incorporated into his music. References to Carl Nielsen's symphonies, especially to the Fourth, which was composed at a time of personal crisis (!), also appear along the way. Quite early in the first movement a flute motif can be heard, a quote from the 3rd movement of Carl Nielsen's Fourth (bar 8):
The Rose-garden starts in idyllic mood with an overtone harmony and a quotation from one of Nørgård's Wölfli songs (Abendlied) - only to be interrupted by a sudden outbreak of catastrophe on the clarinets in bar 18. Listen to this music sample, which begins shortly before the clarinet outburst:
Moreover, this clarinet outburst reminds one of the the woodwind outburst at the beginning of Nielsen's Fourth (bars 2-4):
Characteristic of the further development of the music are the many harmonies involving major and minor thirds. And then, out of a distorted Swiss mountain idyll, the 'Robin-chat' appears - the song of the lark (bars 55-57):
This motif now becomes the dominant one. It may be heard at several tempo layers simultaneously and grows and grows to the proportions of a Kafkaesque monster insect - only to disappear suddenly in favour of a restrained and yet dangerous little clarinet motif, with the same intervals as in the beginning of Nielsen's Fourth (bar 93):
Score sample © Edition WH