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Asyla, Opus number. 17, is an composition by the British composer Thomas Adès. It was finished in 1997 and has been performed widely, especially by the British conductor Simon Rattle. It has been described as a symphony, the third movement being its unacknowledged scherzo.
This piece is best known for its third movement, which features techno music-like traits. Adès himself narrated the compositional process as follows:
Asyla received critical praise and won a Royal Philharmonic Society Music Award in 1997 and the Grawemeyer Award for Music Composition in 2000. It was eventually published by Faber Music in 2000.
It is scored for a very large orchestra, which, in addition to the standard instrumentation, also includes 3 pianos (a grand piano and 2 upright pianos, one tuned a quarter tone lower, doubling celesta and grand piano four-hands), six percussionists playing a large range of instruments, and woodwinds doubling bass oboe, bass flute and contrabass clarinet in addition to the standard auxiliaries.Thomas Adès (1999). 057151863X, Faber. 057151863X
Percussion instruments include 5 or 6 timpani, 3 or 4 , 5 tuned hand drums, 2 , over 2 octaves of tuned Almglocken, 4 , chinese cymbal, 2 Hi-hat, 3 Aluminum can, ocean drum (geophone), water gong, 2 ratchets, washboard, 11 tuned , 4 of various sizes, splash cymbal, 2 , sandpaper blocks, a bag of cutlery, glockenspiel, Cymbal, 2 orchestral and a kit bass drum, and 2 octaves of crotales.
The piece starts with an untitled movement with cowbells and the flat piano, which is immediately followed by the French horn and the high-pitched sound of the strings. The general atmosphere of the movement becomes much more agitated when the rest of the orchestra joins in progressively. The second movement begins abruptly and suddenly changes to a soft melody played by the bass oboe. Then the strings take over with a style which has been classified by some critics as "Richard Wagner". The sound starts to dissipate towards the end of the movement, fading out using the highest and lowest registers simultaneously.
The third movement tries to resemble "the atmosphere of a massive nightclub with people dancing and taking drugs". It has a steady rhythm which has been compared to Igor Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring. The music here is much more insistent than in the previous movements and is much more vivid and lively. After reaching a climax echoed by the strings, the fourth movement becomes calmer at the beginning, and suddenly turns violent when a tutti chord initiated by the horns bursts towards the end of the piece. Asyla ends in a quiet but trembling manner.
In popular culture
The third movement is featured in season 4 episode 10 of the Amazon Prime series Mozart in the Jungle.
See also
Further reading
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