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In the wake of their acclaimed comeback album 'Figures' (2020), Aksak Maboul took a playful sideways step to create this total work, a 63-minute, continuous suite of fifteen pieces, which could be described as an experimental audio play. The thread running through 'Une aventure de VV (Songspiel)' is Véronique Vincent’s text, an enigmatic philosophical-poetical tale unfolding through monologues and dialogues, spoken and sung by a series of characters, played by Alig Fodder, Laetitia Sadier, Audr…
*2022 stock.* Exemplum Rhythmicus is Bi Nostalgia’s minimal wonder from 1990 (originally released under the artist’s name Luca Rigato on the Veronese cassette label Diagrapho). Long coveted and hunted by collectors, it falls among the strange and definition resistant artefacts of Italy’s remarkable avant-garde music scene of the 1980s. An emblem of sonic diversity rendered through electronic sound, distilling a daunting number of traditions and ideas, while sculpting its own world of creative si…
Peter Brötzmann has always created and still creates the covers of his recordings himself – sometimes also for other musician colleagues – and in the past also often the posters for various FMP projects (Workshop Freie Musik in the Academy of Arts or Total Music Meeting in the Quartier Latin, later in Podewil). “Looking at his early posters and record covers it’s striking how fully formed his visual sense was from the very beginning. He had a background from both advertising and Fluxus art…
The festival, which is now 50 years old, was designed from the start to be an alternative concept, one that would refuse to be part of the mainstream. Instead, it wanted to be understood as a major (social) experiment in which the dialogue between musicians and audience formed part of the programme. Perhaps that’s exactly how the book should be written: as a dialogue between musicians and audience, without an omniscient author.
[re]visiting Moers Festival is not a meta-account. [re]visiting Moer…
Mondo Groove present a reissue of Marcello Giombini's Computer Disco, originally released in 1982. Computer Disco is the greatest Euro-synth, disco album of early '80s and now it's finally being reissued by Mondo Groove. Computer Disco is the most Kraftwerk-ian Italian production. Marcello Giombini was a pioneer of early sequencers and on this cult LP, he produced cheesy, cosmic synth pop, with a little bit of Italo disco mixed in. Every fan of '70s/'80s synthesizer music and electronic DJs shou…
The Music Mind Experience is all about how we can transform our playing and listening into convincing performances and satisfying meditations every time. No neuroscience here: this book is thoroughly practical, intuitive, chock-full of simple practices and deep, common-sense insights. “A fantastic resource. Karl’s purpose is to reach beyond all intellectual concepts and feel the magic of intuitive playing and listening that we are all born with. Very easy to read and follow“ says the world-renow…
Two events in music history had revolutionary consequences: the creation of notation and the invention of electronic sound. The initial stages of electronic music brought about new musical instruments like the theremin, the electric guitar and the synthesizer. In the digital age, the computer has itself become a musical instrument, with the invention of live electronics providing traditional instruments, such as the violin or piano, with new, unimagined sonic possibilities. The SWR Experimentals…
A beautifully produced 4-CD box set of John Cage's 'Number Pieces', played by Apartment House. With 44-page booklet and CDs in individual card wallets with original artwork by Arvinda Gray. These extraordinarily beautiful works were all composed in the last 5 years of the composer's life, as Cage approached his 80th birthday. These recordings by Apartment House are the first recordings for 15 years of almost all of the pieces. An essential release of wonderful but somewhat neglected music.
In th…
Nine solos for Hardanger fiddle, composed and performed by Sarah-Jane Summers, a virtuosic Scottish musician based in Norway. Sarah-Jane's music stretches from traditional folk music to experimental work. This album is one of experimental solos, but nonetheless contains references to traditional music both in the titles of the pieces, and sometimes in the music itself.
First, long over-due, Another Timbre disc of the US composer Evan Johnson. Five works from his unique, whispering soundworld. Three pieces in the ‘L’art de toucher le clavecin’ series, with ‘thaes ofereode, thisses swa maeg’ for cello and voice, and ‘Plan and section of the same reservoir’ played by Trio Accanto. Note that the CD version of this album includes a fifth track, 'Plan and section of the same reservoir', which can't be included as part of the Bandcamp download for copyright reasons.…
A 45-minute single movement piece for shō, Hammond organ and cello, exploring ways of combining the differing tuning systems inherent in the instruments.
This album contains three works by Seamus Cater, including his creative response to the work of Alexander John Ellis (1814-1890), who presented a paper 'The History of Musical Pitch' to the Royal Society in 1880. Ellis was a mathematician, collector, philologist and musical enthusiast, who spent a lot of time measuring the exact frequencies of contemporary and ancient musical instruments, and so is remembered as one of the founders of comparative musicology. Two of the pieces on the disc are 're…
Beautiful 54-minute work by Magnus Granberg, written for and wonderfully played by Apartment House. As with almost all of Granberg's compositions, a strong ability in improvisation is essential as the score presents musicians with pools of musical material from which they have to select sounds according to what they are hearing in the moment from the other musicians. Sumptuously gorgeous music.
Two orchestral works by Adrián Demoč, the highly-acclaimed Slovak composer currently based in Spain. The title track 'Neha' (2018) creates a shimmering tension by overlaying 'well-tempered' chords with the same chords using natural harmonics outside of the tempered tuning system. This doubling creates a gentle trembling of interferences. The second piece, 'Popínavá hudba', evolves from a single melodic line, which is repeated with slight variations such that it curves and is bent into fascinatin…
There are certain works by minimalist pioneer Terry Riley that are rightly celebrated as classics, paradigm-shifting masterpieces that exerted a wide influence within classical music, but also well beyond its often hermetic borders. Hello, “Baba O’Riley!” But there is so much more in his repertoire deserving the same accolades. On “Terry Riley: Keyboard Studies”, released by Another Timbre, one of the premiere contemporary music labels of our time, three mid-1960s masterpieces are interpreted by…
An album from andPlay - Maya Bennardo on violin, and Hannah Levinson on viola. Brilliant performances of two pieces: Catherine Lamb's 'Prisma Interius VIII' (Melodic Duo) and Kristofer Svensson's 'Vid stenmuren blir tanken blomma'.
“Translucent Harmonies” allows listeners to deeply immerse themselves in sound, silence, and resonance. This hour-long program includes Prisma Interius VIII by Catherine Lamb (USA) and Vid stenmuren blir tanken blomma by Kristofer Svensson (Sweden), both composed in j…
Another young composer who you’ve probably not heard of, but whose music you really should get to know. Four stunning pieces, three played by Apartment House, and one by the Rothko Collective. Brilliant music that really shouldn’t be possible from someone so young.
A haunting 55-minute work for voice, piano and electronics by one of the world's leading experimental composers. Natural World is in three sections - Field Guide, Chorus and Seascape. It starts playfully, with Juliet Fraser singing encyclopedia-style facts about birds and animals against Mark Knoop's stop-start piano motif. But, following the introduction of field recordings and then electronics, the music gradually - almost imperceptibly - becomes darker until, without ever explicitly addressin…