Toshio Hosokawa: Extasis for violin solo (2016/2020) Score-video

Performer: Annette Bik (violin) Notes by the composer: To me, the primitive form of music lies in Shamanism. When a Shaman prays, he/she sings from this world to another world and communicates with a world we cannot see in our daily lives. To me Sayaka Shoji performing the violin looks like the figure of a Miko. She uses the violin as an extension of her own voice (song), and sings, trying to unite the immense energies of the universe flowing within and outside her. Extasis means to go beyond one’s boundaries. It is the desire to leave the borders of the everyday order of existence itself, to escape from the ego, and an uncontrollable, impulsive yearning for the bottomless, swamp-like depths of existence (chaos). The sounds of the violin are like lines in eastern calligraphy, drawn and cast by the player (miko) into the space and into the void.