Title : Lorentzen - Mercurius Duration : 04:48 Posted : 01 May 2016 - 07:05
Lorentzen - Mercurius
Bent Lorentzen (b.1935) - Mercurius from The Planets Written between 1982 and 1996 Bent Lorentzen's setting of The Planets differs radically from the more familiar setting of Gustav Holst. Lorentzen is more concerned with the astrological than the astronomical significance of the planets. It is for that reason that his suite refers not to the nine known planets in our solar system (written while Pluto was still considered a planet!), but to those, including the sun and moon, which were known to the medieval astronomers. The entire work lasts just under an hour and is linked together by shared motifs and sonorities. Mercurius (Mercury), written in 1995, is the shortest of the seven movements and is the scherzo of the suite. It is inspired by the image of Mercury as the winged messenger of the gods. The music is constructed from an alternating series of four distinct textures suggesting, in the composer's words, "weightlessness and hurried energy."
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