Music for Tuba – Øystein Baadsvik

Øystein Baadsvik – tuba virtuoso!

One of the world´s premier tubaists, Øystein Baadsvik, performs, with pianist Niklas Sivelöv and The Swedish Brass Quintet, modern music for tuba on this recording. With a background in not just classical music, but also big bands and rock bands, Baadsvik has laid extensive touring behind him, including the role as soloist with most Norwegian symphony orchestras. On this album he moves elegantly between a range of different works from the previous century, including several written especially for Baadsvik.

First out is Paul Hindemith´s “Sonata for Bass Tuba and Piano”, a piece belonging to his later orientation towards a more dissonant tone language – a contrast to his theories of the tonality as the force of gravity in music. Next out is Trygve Madsen´s “Sonata for Tuba and Piano”, a piece obviously written for the musicians and the audience and not against them, with its mild chromatic, flowing melody and moderate tonal style. Niklas Sivelöv´s “Sonata for Tuba and Piano”, on the other hand, is a more technical demanding work in its combination of the “musikantisch Spiel”-tradition and a more modernistic style in which the exploration of the instrument´s tonal resources is an important element. Even less “musikantisch” and melodious is William Kraft´s “Encounters II for Tuba Solo”, the most modernistic piece on the album. More declamatory than melodious, it savours the different contrasts in tone colour and mood in the instrument´s register. In Morten Gaathaug´s “Sonata Concertante”, Øystein Baadsvik returns yet again to the readily comprehensible. With its vigorous, often three-tone based themes and simple harmony, this is music which lets diversion take the lead. Nothing is at risk here but the music itself, which is almost cheeky in its immediate simplicity.