Water can provide complete stillness or rapid movement. It can either emit calm, grounding energy or an intense storm. Water encompasses all that is ever-changing while still retaining its original form. Emil Tellefsen, a third-year student at DU, captures all of this and more in his first-ever EP.
Released Oct. 12, “Water” consists of four instrumental songs curated by the music composition major. This EP has been Emil Tellefsen’s largest-scale project to date, taking around nine months from the first sketches to the final draft.
“It was an opportunity for me to do a deep dive on string writing. I got to explore all kinds of extended techniques with the help of my amazing performers,” he said.
Emil Tellefsen got the motivation to put out an EP after seeing his friends in DU band Exhaler release their single, “Where Were You When the Streetlamps Went Out.”
“I immediately knew that releasing a professional recording of my music was something I needed to do for my own satisfaction,” he said.
Classical composition students have a hard time getting music recorded and released early in their careers, and Tellefsen has been loving the experience that comes with breaking into the genre as well as playing a part in ending the stigma around classical music.
The assumption that classical music is boring is common and draws many listeners away, but Tellefsen says that couldn’t be farther from the truth.
“In reality, much like any other genre of music, it can have widely varying energies and emotions. ‘Water’ spans a spectrum of meditative to climactic moments. For example, ’Currents,’ has a rather calming effect while ’Ebb’ is adventurous and exciting,” Emil Tellefsen said.
“Water” takes listeners on a deep, immersive journey in only 20 minutes and lives up to the title in every imaginable way. In the same theme as the EP, the cover art holds its own story and serves as the perfect image to go alongside the instrumentals.
Lina Tellefsen is the musician’s sister and artist behind the scenes. The siblings worked back and forth pulling at ideas of rain and drawing inspiration from Monet’s “Water Lilies.” She drew up many versions until they agreed upon the final piece with the necessary edition of the rocks to provide a more grounding feeling.
“To me, the ‘Water’ EP had this fantastical and whimsical aspect to it, and I wanted to bring that into the cover art. The tone of the music is overall pretty mellow, but there’s this warmth that shines through it,” Lina Tellefsen said.
The sibling duo have collaborated and put their skills together in the past, making this project one of their many successes together.
“Emil is incredibly talented, and I think our styles complement each other pretty well,” Lina Tellefsen said.
Reflecting on the pieces in the EP, Emil Tellefsen tells of each song having its own story within the realms of water as a whole.
“My favorite piece is ‘Ebb,’ it was the most fun to compose and I still have the most fun listening to it,” he said. “I think I’m most proud of ‘Rain’, which stretched my compositional skills the farthest out of all the movements.”
“Water” has been a large first step into classical composition for Emil Tellefsen and he looks forward to continuing within the genre. He is filled with extreme gratitude as people continue to listen and stream the EP.
“It fills my heart to have people interested in my music, and every time someone tells me of their experience listening to ‘Water’ I get a bit emotional,” he said.
Stream “Water” now on every music platform.
