Ragnarök

Background Note

In Norse mythology, Ragnarök is a series of events, including a great battle, foretelling the death of numerous significant figures such as the gods Odin, Thor, Týr, Freyr, Heimdallr, and Loki), natural disasters, and the submersion of the world in water. After these events, the world will rise again, cleansed and fertile, the surviving and returning gods will meet and two human survivors will repopulate the world. Ragnarök is an essential event in Norse mythology and has been the subject of scholarly discourse and theory in the history of Germanic studies. The event is attested primarily in the Poetic Edda, compiled in the 13th century from earlier traditional sources, and the Prose Edda, written in the 13th century by Snorri Sturluson. In the Prose Edda and in a single poem in the Poetic Edda, the event is referred to as Ragnarøkkr (Old Norse for 'Twilight of the Gods'), a usage popularised by 19th-century composer Richard Wagner with the title of the last of his Der Ring des Nibelungen operas, Götterdämmerung (1876), which is "Twilight of the Gods" in German.

Program Note 

The opening starts with Heimdallr’s horn. (Preferably played off-stage) This is the signal that starts Ragnarök. The start of Ragnarök is with a simple chorale, that the bases then interrupt, which signals the armies marching onto Midgard. Once they arrive, everything goes into a spiral, with the lows leading. The style of this piece is to be heavy but moving. There are a lot of open voicings and syncopated rhythms that all need to be short and dry, therefore they do not cover up the lows/melody. There are two main themes that happen in this piece. At the beginning with the lows, and in the 7⁄8 with trombones 5 and 6. These themes get turned around and reharmonized throughout the piece, but the core of them should always be emphasized. Once the dust settles and everything is made new, we enter into the rebuilding stage and morning. This is started off with the solo trombone (tbn. 6) and it grows as the realms begin to recover and build back. But the story of Ragnarök is that it is an endless cycle of life and death. Everything picks back up and the piece comes to an epic close.