"Arctic Variations" performance (and video)

For those that missed last weekend, sharing the video of my "Arctic Variations" for orchestra, performed by the Iași "Moldova" Philharmonic Orchestra under Mihail Agafita.

The piece is influenced by the photographic series “Find a way or make one” by Anastasia Mityukova whose images are inspired by Robert Peary’s expedition to the North Pole in 1909. Her series contains a variety of photographs of ice, auroras and various snow-filled scenes.

The musical work is loosely constructed around these images and Peary’s voyage through the stark wilderness of snow, wind and ice: from a cold, still introduction to marching through the snow with his team of fellow explorers, to blizzards and white-outs, and finally the arrival at the Pole in the winds, concluding – as in the beginning – with a recapitulation of the arctic stillness.