French composer Lili Boulanger (1893–1918) was an immense musical talent from a young age. Despite suffering chronic illness, she composed prolifically, creating substantial, potently expressive works for choir, voice, piano, chamber ensemble, and orchestra, and was at work on an opera when intestinal tuberculosis claimed her life at only 24 years old. In 1913, she became the first woman to win the prestigious Prix de Rome. Her distinctive style bears qualities typical of early 20th century French music, influenced, notably, by Gabriel Fauré and Claude Debussy in her synthesis of tonal and modal harmony, combined with her imaginative use of instrumental colour and layered textures.

In 1917, Lili composed two pieces, D’un soir triste (Of a Sad Evening) and D’un matin de printemps (Of a Spring Morning). She conceived each of them in three versions for different instrumentation and forces: duos for violin (or cello) and piano for D’un soir triste, violin (or flute) and piano for D’un matin de printemps; and for both works, settings for piano trio and for orchestra. At this time, Lili’s health was in evident decline, and though these works were reportedly the last that she was able to write in her own hand, surviving manuscripts of the orchestral versions, which were completed in January 1918, are notated by her sister Nadia.

To the extent that they’re based on the same musical theme, D’un soir triste and D’un matin de printemps are companion pieces but they can be performed individually. The latter was premiered almost exactly three years after Lili’s death, on March 13, 1921, by the Concerts Pasdeloup orchestra conducted by Rhené-Baton at the Paris Conservatoire.

Energetic and full of vibrant orchestral colour, D’un matin de printemps is a striking and optimistic work. A steady pattern of short notes in the upper strings, tinged with glints of triangle and celesta, form a propulsive backdrop over which solo flute plays the spirited main theme. These materials are passed around the orchestra—the woodwinds are particularly prominent (a characteristically French feature), with their bright and delicate timbres contrasting the lushly smooth strings. After blossoming into a decisive horn call and a snare drum flourish, the music sinks into murkiness (marked “mysterious” in the score) with winding lines in the lower registers of the woodwinds. Out of this, a dreamlike passage featuring divided strings emerges and blooms into a sumptuous romantic episode. Thereafter, the music shifts back and forth between the sound realms of the opening—lively, alert, pointillistic—and the hazy ethereality of the dreamscape, including a duet between muted violins of fairy-like nimbleness, and an easy-going melody in the cellos. Eventually, the original energy returns and builds to a brilliant statement of the main theme, after which the work finishes with a spectacular descending harp glissando and a final orchestral punch.

“One of the most distinctive voices in contemporary music” (NPR), Icelandic composer Anna Thorvaldsdottir (b. 1977) is known for her highly atmospheric and texturally imaginative works. Her “detailed and powerful” (The Guardian) orchestral writing has garnered her awards from the New York Philharmonic, Lincoln Center, the Nordic Council, and the UK’s Ivors Academy, as well as commissions and performances by many of the world’s leading orchestras, ensembles, and arts organizations. She is currently Composer-in-Residence with the Iceland Symphony Orchestra, and this year, she will also be in residence at the Aldeburgh Festival and at the Tanglewood Festival of Contemporary Music. She holds a PhD from the University of California in San Diego.

Anna says her music is “written as an ecosystem of sounds, where all materials continuously grow in and out of each other, transforming in the process”; it’s also often “inspired in an important way by nature and its many qualities, in particular structural ones, like proportion and flow.” Her piece Catamorphosis, composed in 2020, features these signature qualities of her compositional style, taken to a new intensity. The Berlin Philharmonic and Kirill Petrenko performed the world premiere in January 2021; tonight, the National Arts Centre Orchestra gives the work’s Canadian premiere.

“The core inspiration behind Catamorphosis,” Anna describes, “is the fragile relationship we have to our planet. The aura of the piece is characterized by the orbiting vortex of emotions and the intensity that comes with the fact that if things do not change it is going to be too late, risking utter destruction—catastrophe. The core of the work revolves around a distinct sense of urgency, driven by the shift and pull between various polar forces—power and fragility, hope and despair, preservation and destruction.”

“Catamorphosis, she continues, “is quite a dramatic piece, but it is also full of hope—perhaps somewhere between the natural and the unnatural, between utopia and dystopia, we can gain perspective and find balance within and with the world around us.”

Structurally, Catamorphosis unfolds as a single movement with seven “atmospheric sub-sections”—Origin, Emergence, Polarity, Hope, Requiem, Potentia, and Evaporation—that trace a compelling organic arc. In an interview for the Berlin Philharmonic, Anna notes that the main musical characteristics of the piece include a “fundamental harmony that carries the structure from relatively early on in the music until the end.” This is paired with various textural elements, of “nuanced sounds” also used throughout. Origin begins with the emerging of non-pitch-based sounds, and these textural materials (such as “airy sounds, percussive attacks”) and the more “traditionally lyrical material” morph in and out of each other to create the musical structure.

The three sections Polarity, Hope, and Requiem form the work’s core—each are almost equal in length and all together comprise about 15 minutes of this 20-minute piece. Polarity begins with forceful statements in the trombones; the section has an ominous, threatening character, out of which a slow-moving melody, full of longing, materializes. Later, tension mounts further but eventually melts into an E-flat major chord, which leads into the Hope section. Here, the harmony slowly oscillates between major and minor, as rhythmically brushed sounds propel the music forward, and violins play upward-reaching flourishes. Near the end of this section, the harmony makes a tectonic-like shift down to D major, then finally settles in C major. Percussive sounds mark the beginning of the Requiem and the energy picks up slightly; the lower strings, later joined by the violins sing a solemn melody. What starts in deep melancholy seems to move toward consolation, reaching peace on the E-flat major sonority, before moving on to Potentia (featuring slowly sliding notes), then the dissipation of sound at the close of Evaporation.