Mood

By Fred-Olav Vatne (Translated from Norwegian by Sarah Osa)

What kind of mood do you prefer to experience while listening to music?

You are likely to have landed on this page because you clicked on “Mood” several times. You may be extra conscious of the kind of mood music expresses, or of how music affects your own mood. Moods are, like many other things, an individual and rather subjective phenomenon witin music. Nevertheless, we are still keen to supply you with some tips on how to locate some atmospheric music.

In broad terms, one might say that all music is an attempt to create a mood. In much of the music we perform, you will probably also find that the type of mood can vary quite widely. Classical works are often divided into three or four parts which are called movements, and the mood can vary greatly within each movement, and from one movement to the next. In short, you should be prepared to experience a variety of different moods when attending one of our concerts.

One might distinguish between two ways to name and describe music: as “programme music”, where a narrative is described, or as “absolute music”, where the composer does not reveal his or her intentions. Programme music could be said to have a slight advantage when it comes to reaching its listeners as it can be somewhat easier to place. In absolute music, one must be one’s own guide. The advantage then is that one can interpret it however one likes.

Sometimes music is imbued with a mood so powerful that it invites to concrete interpretation. Ludwig van Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 14 was nicknamed The Moonlight Sonata more than thirty years after it was written, but the name was exceptionally fitting, and stuck. Similarly, the “Fate” Symphony, Beethoven’s Fifth, was not given that title by its creator. But the description resonated, and grew permanent roots.

Beethoven also composed programme music. In his sixth symphony, the Pastorale, he depicts an idyllic rural scene complete with birdsong, a gurgling brook, village life and a thunderstorm. Hector Berlioz composed his Symphonie Fantastique some decades later, where he conjured up a magical ball and a chilling vision of his own execution (no doubt brought on by smoking opium).

Towards the end of the 19th century, symphony orchestras grew in size and orchestra music became more varied and sophisticated. French composers Claude Debussy and Maurice Ravel were described as Impressionists due to their remarkable ability to evoke impressions, atmospheres and feelings, for instance in the former’s Afternoon of a Faun and La Mer (“The Sea”), and in the latter’s Daphnis and Chloe and Mother Goose (Ma Mère L’Oye).

In the decades around 1900, many composers cultivated a particular form of programme music, namely the tone poem. These were often relatively short musical works, often written in a single segment, which concentrated on a single idea or story. Also sprach Zarathustra by Richard Strauss, Finlandia, and The Swan of Tuonela by Jean Sibelius, Isle of the Dead by Serge Rachmaninov and Moldau by Bedrich Smetana are all famous examples.

Later in the 1900’s, the spectrum of moods was further expanded, and the appearance of film music enhanced this development. Ralph Vaughan Williams’ Sinfonia Antartica, for instance, started as music to a film about polar explorer Robert Falcon Scott’s freezing adventures. Vaughan Williams’ abilities as a creator of moods is also in evidence as he imitates the lark in his work The Lark Ascending.

Harmonious music rich in melody may have dominated movie theatres, but more daring filmmakers have included more experimental, atonal music. In The Shining, film director Stanley Kubrick makes use of the work of well-known modernists such as Bela Bartók, György Ligeti and Krysztof Penderecki in order to evoke an eerie and dark mood.