On Friday, October 15, the 67th International Composers’ Competition “Rostrum” ended, in which the composer Krists Auznieks won the main prize in the group of young composers under the age of 30 for the composition “Are One”. A representative of Latvian Radio in this competition – Signe Lagzdiņa, program manager of LR3 “Klasika” – reports about it in a telephone interview from Belgrade.
Liene Jakovleva: You have already spent a whole week in Belgrade, participating in the 67th International Composition Competition “Rostrum”, which has now ended. As I understand it, you have very good news to tell the listeners of “Klasikas” as the first ones.
Signe Lagzdina: Indeed, it is, we have spent all this weekday working hard, listening to more than eight hours of contemporary music – a total of 37 compositions from 21 countries were offered. And as always, “Rostrum” – at the same time it is an exchange point with contemporary music in an international environment, meeting radio colleagues and also getting to know a new place. But there are also prizes and winners in the competition, and after listening, we – each country’s radio delegate – had to vote for 10 compositions in the main category, just like in Eurovision, and for three compositions in the category of young composers (up to 30 years old).
And the good news is that for the second time in a row, Latvia has received an award in the category of young composers!
This time we offered Krista Auznieks’ composition “Are One”, which was premiered during the performance of the contemporary chamber opera “Current. Time present”, with the participation of “Sinfonietta Rīga”, Normunds Šnē and Jānis Šipkēvics.
I am very happy that it does not often happen that one country receives one of the main prizes twice in a row. Great joy for Christ. I can also tell you who received the prize in the main category then – it is definitely a coincidence, because the main prize went to the Serbian composer, and her name is Ivan Ognanovich. And it was also a great job for the orchestra with electronics, but I’ll talk more about it on Tuesday, and then we’ll listen to the compositions, because each participating country, then ten works from those selected and voted in the top ten, play on their radio stations.
Have you already informed Christ Auznieks and his opus players about this wonderful news?
We have a busy time at the moment, I am together with other radio delegations, I wrote a message to Christ – it turns out that Christ is not in Latvia at the moment, he is in America, because he just started this day with this beautiful message. I will send a message to the players soon and I know that they will be very, very happy.
But interesting – a lot of people asked me the question, which is Jānis Šipkēvics.
Is he a countertenor, because of course you can hear the influences of pop music in his voice, but many colleagues, who also made some comments after the performance of the piece, said that the composer has found a great way to merge genres without making anything banal or something unenjoyable .
A moment from the jury in the competition “Rostrum”
Photo: Signe Lagzdiņa
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That’s really wonderful news on such a gray Friday night. Do you know what dominance is? Did the majority of voters weigh in favor of Kristaps Auznieks, or is it still behind you – these numbers and statistics.
We’ll get the numbers later, but
There is another good news – Krists Auznieks has also entered the top ten of the big, main category. I know that many colleagues had a big dilemma about which category to vote for.
This year, too, it was an unconventional situation that the category of young composers was very large – there was a large predominance in this category.
You probably shouldn’t have voted for Christ the Great yourself?
Just like in Eurovision, your country does not vote for itself.
Behind the scenes of Signe Lagzdiņa competition “Rostrum”
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I will ask you differently – what was your sympathy, does your sympathy coincide with the end result?
I have to admit that not at all, but at the same time there were really very good works – very different, for different compositions. From chamber music there was, for example, a composition from Mexico for flute and electronics, but then there are the big works of the orchestra, what is the work of the choir – how to evaluate it all? Because everyone is good in nature.
I was very moved by the Lithuanian composition written for the piano quartet – at the same time minimalist technique, tonality, sometimes something fresh and unheard, as I noticed several tendencies: more and more composers turn to pure sound, very static, tonal, melodic.
But, of course, there are other trends – as in contemporary music, very different. The Norwegians had a very interesting composition, and the Poles also had a very interesting composition of the new generation.
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