Constellation (2003)
(version for orchestra)

The first version of Constellation for octet was written in 2002, when Gidon Kremer asked me to write a new piece for the sextet of the Kremerata Baltica during a series of performances of my works at his festival in Lockenhaus. The sextet's original scoring for string quintet plus percussion was expanded to include two horns.

Immediately after the premiere, I began to expand the work even further. The now large string section serves as a much more massive body of sound in which glissandi spread out from a single note in phrases. Wide sound surfaces expand and implode again and again in dense clusters.

The four horns, placed in stereophonic pairs to the right and left of the conductor, create explosions of sound through repetitive lines and motivic escapades. Like a constantly fluctuating constellation of stars, individual notes form chord-like sound constellations and move on.

The sampler mainly acts as a sonic extension of the four horns, creating distortions and alienations of the physical sound. Wide layers and dense clusters contrast in the course of the piece and form energetic rhythmic cores and atmospheric soundscapes before the music dissolves at the end.

Minas Borboudakis, May 2022