Ultima 2018, Oslo

Abstract

Unfolding over ten days in September 2018, this year's edition of Ultima was centred on the theme of migration, with a focus on both music and people. In his preface to the festival programme, Thørbjorn Tønder Hansen, the new artistic director, writes, ‘The borders of contemporary music are happily eroding, and the scene is in constant flux’. Responding to the multiple pressures of asylum seekers in Europe, demographic inequities in the representation of artists and composers, and the growing collective sense that ‘New Music’ is on the cusp of some kind of significant re-orientation, Hansen and his curatorial team produced a significant accomplishment by bringing together such a varied selection of programming. The range of installations included symphonic work; multi-channel acousmatic pieces with live diffusion to performance pieces with new applications of technology; and experimental theatre pieces set inside the black box or at a rugged outdoor setting far beyond Oslo's city limits. Ultima tipped its cap to just about anything that could set foot within the expanded terrain of ‘music composition’ today.