An der Schwelle

“‘On the Threshold’ (‘Sheng Su’) employs a non-linear, fragmented musical form to depict a philosophical liminal state: Ten musicians create a fluid structure of condensation and dissolution, of sound and silence, of individual and collective. The work deliberately avoids narration and understands ‘listening’ as a form of being. Peace appears here not as an external goal, but as an inner transformation—born from openness to uncertainty and togetherness.
Sheng Su was commissioned by the University of Oldenburg in 2020 for the symposium ‘Between Times.’ The composition understands sound as a three-dimensional form, not merely as the passage of time. In six movements, flute, percussion, and piano work with interference and multi-layered structures, whose subtle nuances interweave to form fluid sonic textures. Instead of motivic development, the work is divided into independent sections—like the facets of a prism. A characteristic feature is the expanded approach to time: The music temporarily detaches itself from "Measurable time and opens up a psychologically perceptible sense of time in which sound, space and time merge into a plastic unity.” (Xiaoyong Chen)