Music for Oslo City Hall
– This is truly a unique space. These are the words of Benedict Mason, the British composer described by The Guardian as «... one of the most original musical minds around today». The main hall in the Oslo City Hall might look familiar for an international audience. 10th December each year, the laureate for the Nobel Peace Prize receives his or her medal and diploma with presidents, kings and other notabilities in their presence.
Music is normally also performed during the ceremony, like when US President Barack Obama’s favourite artist Esperanza Spalding entered the podium at the latest price ceremony.
Music in the broom cupboard
But the Benedict Mason work will not limit itself to this main hall alone. The audience might be guided into conference rooms, ventilation canals, the City Parliament Hall where decisions for Oslo are made, libraries and even broom cupboards in order to experience Mason’s work.
– I invited Mason because I am exited about his approach to composition, says Lars Petter Hagen, director of Ultima 2010.
– His music is both personal and original with a lack of respect for convention. And at the same time connected to the European new music tradition, with solid craftsmanship and as a foundation. His work defies the normal categories for contemporary music.
Mason’s work for Oslo City Hall will be a part of his series Music for European Concert Halls, in which the pieces are made with the intent of taking advantage of the tone and the various architectural characteristics of that different concert halls bring. Mozartsaal in Alte Oper in Frankfurt, Espace de Projection at the IRCAM/Pompidou Centre in Paris, Paradiso in Amsterdam and Kultur und Kongresszentrum in Luzern are all among the places being dedicated pieces by Mason.
- All works are site specific
These kinds of musical works are often labelled site-specific. Hagen claims that all music is site-specific – Mason just makes this point more evident.
– In my opinion no music or other forms of art can be jugded without taking the context it exists in into consideration. Music arises in a certain historical period with its social and cultural circumstances, it is performed in a certain space, and the audience at the time have their certain expectations when the come to hear the music. Mason uses these features to create works that are truly unique. This is brave. Large parts of the contemporary music scene base their work on concerts that are ready for touring, you practise, pack up and go. His music is made to exist here and now, for those who are there at the time of the performance.