“Universum II” is a composition for strings & clarinet, composed for “The Pale Blue Dot” project founded by Arjan de Wit and Bas Bouma.
[listen to Universum II example]
About the project
The earth is but a pale blue pixel in a vast space: “The Pale Blue Dot”. The photo was taken by spacecraft “Voyager 1″ from behind the rings of Saturn commissioned by astronomer and astrophysicist Carl Sagan. The project: ” The Pale Blue Dot”, is a musical journey starting in space from behind the rings of planet Saturn and ending on Earth. Six young composers had to write together a multimedia music concert, while drawing inspiration from the photographs taken by Voyager 1. The photo raises all kinds of questions. You can look at it with humanistic, scientific or religious eyes. What does this picture mean in terms of ideas of how we came to earth, and more importantly, how we look at ourselves? Besides the music, a number of composers engaged in cooperation with filmmakers, artists and animators. This included a different view in the story of the composers and in various ways encouraged to reflect on this issue.
Augusto Meijer, electroacoustic music composer 