Moorland Elegies for mixed choir and string orchestra (2015)
Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir
Tallinn Chamber Orchestra
Conductor Risto Joost

Moorland Elegies (2015) is a 50-minute work for mixed choir and string orchestra by Estonian composer Tõnu Kõrvits (b. 1969). This work, a nine-part cycle, is a crowning achievement of its composer Tõnu Kõrvits’s magical impressionism. The work was premiered by the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir and the Tallinn Chamber Orchestra at Tallinn’s St. John’s Church on 31 October 2015, conducted by Risto Joost. The cycle is shaped and animated by its texts: a selection of poems by the English author Emily Brontë (1818–1848). “Moorland Elegies is a journey into the darkest, most mysterious corners of loneliness: to where one doesn’t dare to peek twice,” Kõrvits has commented. The selection of poetry in Moorland Elegies contains bright, sorrowful, dramatic, and divine scenes that form no coherent plot. There are only spiritual conditions characterized by a certain poetical abstraction, which develop through natural imagery and spatial impressions.
Tõnu Kõrvits works belong to the repertoire of the most important Estonian orchestras, choirs and artists. In recent years his music has been performed more and more outside of his native Estonia. Beside Veljo Tormis’s shamanistic spells, Erkki-Sven Tüür’s energetic explosions and Arvo Pärt’s religious contemplations, Kõrvits’s sound world stands out as highly poetic, full of visionary fantasies. His music carries the listener along on hypnotic journeys through the landscapes of nature and folk tradition, human soul and subconscious. His oeuvre includes all traditional genres from orchestral and instrumental music to choral music and operas.

Look for more: Ondine

Review: Klassik Heute
Muusikatuba, ERR, Klassikaraadio (Estonian Classic Radio)
Nädala plaat. Haavatav, aus ja jäägitu (Postimees, Johanna Mängel)
Fanfare Magazine Archive