Performance of “Awakening” by Ludwig Tuman

Like most of Ludwig Tuman’s writing, Awakening, a work for chamber orchestra, resists being easily classified.

While composed in an atonal idiom, it contains hints of the classical music of Java, the raga of India, the baroque concerto grosso, and other sources that attentive listening will discover, blended together within a coherent artistic statement.

Awakening is not program music in the sense of following a specific story line. However, as its title suggests, the music does evoke a movement from darkness into light, from dreams to consciousness. Listeners have described their experience of listening to it in terms of an individual awakening, nature’s revival after winter, creatures evolving over eons, and an entire world spinning into the morning.

Learn more about Ludwig Tuman and his music.