Asta Hyvärinen: Star Child Arise/Star Child Aria

Asta Hyvärinen (b. 1963) has described her composition style with the term “surrealist-cubism”. This means the structures are based on the surrealistic (subconscious) process and the sonic details appearance as cubistic. She uses also the term “whole tonality” which means equality of any kind of sounding material (chromatic; microtonal; noises & any kind of unpitched sounds). Another important structural concept related to her music is “melodic contour”. Most of her works composed during past
20 years are some kind of cross-sections of a shattering world. Besides her composition work she plays drums and percussion instruments in her group Con Fusion.

Star Child Arise/Star Child Aria is written for soprano, six instruments and electronics. The piece is a
fragment of the unfinished stage work Voyager 2077 A Space Opera featuring a libretto by Johanna Sinisalo. Events of this two part composition are set in the near future. In the first part The Star Child has been chosen and she/he’s been connected as a part of new technology ”Voyager 2077” space craft that travels in far, deep space heading to its final destination: To recontact with the Voyager 2 probe with which we have lost contact for an unknown reason. In the second part The Star Child has grown up and moved in time in the year 2077 and in space in the Inner Oort Cloud. The piece is composed with the support of The MES and The Finnish Cultural Foundation