Isär

commission: Norrbotten Neo (NNEO)
first performance: 25.4.2012, New Sweden Festival, Stockholm, Sweden
ensemble Norrbotten Neo
publisher: Svensk Musik

Isär (Apart)
(in memory of my father)

My father grew up in a little Finnish speaking village by river Muonio which forms a border between Sweden and Finland. I knew beforehand that this work would bear traces of my father. My thoughts circled daily around him, my Isä - Finnish for father - who had suffered for years with Alzheimer's disease. His thoughts retreated to his childhood in Norrbotten during the 1940's. An accelerating and obsession overcame him to leave home. Finally, nothing could keep him alive: the time felt apart - or (isär in Swedish). 


Madeleine Isaksson