Ultima Silvestrov Thoresen

Lasse Thoresen (b. 1949) has been a leading figure among Norwegian contemporary composers for several years and is today a professor of composition at the Norwegian Academy of Music. Over the years, he has been inspired by, among other things, Norwegian folk music, French spectral music, and various Asian musical and cultural expressions. ΩN: Det værende was written for the Oslo Philharmonic's 100th anniversary and, like many of Thoresen's compositions, has a strong spiritual dimension based on the Bahá'í religion.

Ukrainian Valentyn Silvestrov (b. 1947) is described as "the most interesting contemporary composer" by Arvo Pärt. Silvestrov was born in Kyiv during Stalin's regime and received his musical education there. In the 1960s he became part of the city's radical composer milieu, and in 1970 was excluded from the Soviet Union of Composers. Since then he developed his tonal language in a tonal direction and is today the most famous Ukrainian orchestral composer. He wrote his Symphony No. 7 in 2003.