Danish Composer Per Nørgård (born 1932) spent much of his career composing with the "infinity series," a system for generating pitches that he developed in 1959. In 1979, his musical style was turned on its head after he encountered the work of Adolf Wölfli, an early 20th century Swiss artist who was severely psychotic and spent his adult life in an asylum. Nørgård wrote, "I experienced the encounter with Wölfli's chaotic art as a mental dive into a dark, different world -- eerie, unpredictable, but fascinating and above ...
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Danish Composer Per Nørgård (born 1932) spent much of his career composing with the "infinity series," a system for generating pitches that he developed in 1959. In 1979, his musical style was turned on its head after he encountered the work of Adolf Wölfli, an early 20th century Swiss artist who was severely psychotic and spent his adult life in an asylum. Nørgård wrote, "I experienced the encounter with Wölfli's chaotic art as a mental dive into a dark, different world -- eerie, unpredictable, but fascinating and above all highly specific." That serves as an apt description of the 1982 opera he wrote about Wölfli's life, The Divine Circus. Scored for six soloists and small chorus, six dancers, six percussionists, amplified cello, and synthesizer, the opera, with a libretto the composer compiled from the artist's voluminous writings, certainly embodies the disjunction, randomness, fantasy, anxiety, alienation, and sheer terror of a psychotic's life. Wölfli is portrayed by four singers, with...
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