Red Sea Jazz Festival

Frederik Magle is a 32 year old composer and organ player from Denmark. He studied organ and composition at the Royal Academy of Music in Denmark. His fame comes from his compositions for the Denmark Royal Family, including the christening ceremony’s music of Prince Nikolai, ten years ago. His other acclaimed composition uses the writings of Denmark’s Prince Henrik and is called Cantabile.

Cantabile is a symphonic suite, formed of three movements. Magle’s composition skills are mainly self developed. As most of his work, Cantabile is melodic with few atonality components.

The first performances of the Cantabile, all played by The Danish National Symphony Orchestra were appreciated both by the present spectators and the music critiques. While the first movement met its audience in 2004, the other two were first performed only this year.

The symphony’s title coincides with the title of Prince Henrik’s poem book. The music has a strong relationship with the text, the result being astonishing.

Cantabile was a major experience in Magle’s composer evolution. The first movement required an entire year of hard work.

The next two movements proved themselves to be a lot more complicated to write. Magle’s attention to detail and his high aspirations made him rewrite these two movement several times. The whole creation process lasted for five years. The final result proves that it worth the effort though.