Sia Nia (2010)

The word “SIA NIA” is a literal (vertical) inversion of the word “VINVIS” (Dutch for “blue whale”). I composed this piece after reading an article in National Geographic, a magazine about nature and science. The article described the migration of the blue whale—the largest animal on Earth—from the polar seas to the breeding grounds off the coast of Mexico. The grandeur, the power, and above all the grace of this immense creature inspired me so deeply that I immediately thought of the instruments best suited to convey this warmth, elegance, and dignity: the saxophones.

“SIA NIA” essentially depicts nothing more than the swimming, surfacing, and diving of a blue whale, after which the traces it leaves in the water remain visible for a long time. The piece begins with a vague sonic landscape in which the whale’s call can already be heard from afar (this call is so loud it can easily be heard up to 400 kilometers away underwater). Then, the whale’s outline becomes visible and it surfaces, trailing behind it a maelstrom that pulls everything in.

Above the surface, the contours of the whale become increasingly distinct, culminating in a massive hissing sound, followed by a towering jet of water that propels minuscule droplets upward at enormous speed, carried away by the wind. This creates a fantastically wild spectacle: the water crashes down on the giant back, which slowly disappears below the surface—first as streams and puddles, then merging into rhythmic patterns of water returning to the sea.

Suddenly, the tail fins emerge from the water—a sign that the whale is about to dive again. With a mighty splash, the enormous creature vanishes beneath the surface. Only the lingering circles in the water betray what has just occurred… until, after a long time, even they fade away.

“There is no living thing whose lines of beauty show more exquisite contours than the crescent-shaped edges of these tail fins…”
— Herman Melville, Moby Dick