Undersong
** 2021 Stock ** An American who came of age in the late 1980s, Jason Eckardt’s music captures the essences of the genres that led him first to performance (as a guitarist), and then to composition: heavy metal and art rock, jazz, gagaku and p’ansori, the Second Viennese School, American post-serialism, and the new complexity. It evokes the power of inspired, virtuosic improvisation, the incisiveness of classical ensemble playing, and the raw expressivity of ethnic music. The first complete CD o…
Signs, Games and Messages
This is the first complete recording of the 24 Signs, Games and Messages by Hungarian composer György Kurtág. Signs, Games and Messages is a collection of very personal miniatures which Kurtág began writing almost 50 years ago, and which he continues to add to through the present day. Many have been written, dedicated or inspired by a particular person; they pass, sometimes impertinent, sad, serene, cheerful, joyful, thoughtful, or melancholic. This CD is completed by the first recordings of fo…
The Works for Percussion I
John Cage’s percussion works are among his most historically important. After 42 Volumes in Mode’s Cage Edition, Mode is releasing the first volume dedicated to his percussion music. Percussion Group Cincinnati is particularly respected for its knowledge of and experience with the entire range of John Cage’s music, having made tours and festival appearances with him on a number of occasions in Europe and in America, and having had pieces created by Cage especially for the Group. Volume 1 cons…
Bolt From The Blue - Music For Piano & Voices
Howard Skempton’s music strikes a chord with many listeners through its deceptive simplicity, beauty and accessible nature. A student of Cornelius Cardew, Skempton was greatly influenced by Satie, Cage and Feldman. This CD of miniatures intersperses choral works with solo piano pieces. The texts for the choral works come from Mary Webb, Edward Thomas, Emerson, Judith Cramond and Longfellow. Liner notes by the composer, who also supervised the choral recording sessions. Skempton was born in 1…
The Works For Saxophone 3 & 4
Ulrich Krieger completes his A Cage of Saxophones survey of Cage’s works composed for, or which can be played on any instrument or instruments. For this volume, Krieger combines works specifically composed for saxophone with works of no specified instrumentation that are suited for saxophones and winds. Most of these are “indeterminate”works, which require the performer to create the realization based on materials supplied by Cage. In some situations, Krieger used Cage’s compositional “tools” …
Maim (Water)
Maim, a major piece in Chaya Czernowin’s œuvre, is a large scale, 50-minute orchestral tryptch with 5 soloists. The 5 soloists are include regular interpreters of her music: Rico Gubler, tubax (a hybrid of a saxophone & tuba); Peter Veale, oboe & musette; John Mark Harris, piano & harpsichord; Seth Josel, guitars; Mary Oliver, viola. Maim, “water” in Hebrew, is the metaphor which dominates the piece. Elementary forms of water appear throughout Maim, musically translated. Scattered droplets — ar…
Responses To Ives
“Responses to Ives” was conceived in 2003 by pianist Heather O’Donnell as a way to acknowledge the 50th anniversary of Charles Ives’s death (May 19, 2004). She approached composers spanning a generation, known to have strong affinities for Ives and asked them to write a “musical reflection” on the presence of Ives in their lives and work. The set was premiered at the MaerzMusik Festival in Berlin in 2004 in the midst of a twelve hour extravaganza of Ives. In the months following repeat perform…
Complete String Quartets
The first complete recording of Xenakis’ string quartets. The first new recording of Xenakis’ first three quartets since 1994. The only available recording of Xenakis’ last quartet, “Ergma”, from 1994. The first commercial release by the JACK Quartet, a young New York/Boston based group that has been garnering high praise for their performances of complex and challenging new music. The members of the quartet met while attending the Eastman School of Music, New York. The quartet has since stud…
Piano Sonatas
Chris Newman is a contemporary composer, painter, author and performance artist living in Berlin. This is the first recording of Newman’s Piano Sonatas, a large and important aspect to his work. The renowned British piano virtuoso and composer Michael Finnissy performs the four sonatas here. Newman and Finnissy have been collaborators for over a quarter century, ensuring definitive performances. Composer supervised recordings. Liner notes by the composer and Michael Finnissy. From 1976-79, C…
Por Gitaro: Suites for Tuned Guitars
First recording of version for just-intonation guitar & just-intonation gamelan Even though Lou Harrison rhapsodized about the “dulcet tones” of the guitar, for much of his career he refused to write for it. The problem was that the guitar’s straight, fixed frets resulted in the tuning system known as equal temperament, while Harrison preferred the crystalline purity of harmony found in the types of tuning known as just intonation. In the 1970s, Harrison learned of a guitar with removable finge…
The Number Pieces 5 - Two2
Laurel Karlik Sheehan gave the Canadian premiere of Two2 with Jack Behrens in 1990. Rob Haskins is a respected John Cage expert and scholar. Together they bring an authority and expertise to this performance of Two2. In most of the Number Pieces, all the performers have some freedom through Cage’s use of time brackets, flexible measures that show a range of possible starting and ending times. The time bracket system of notation used in these works allows a certain amount of flexibility in the p…
Number Pieces 4
The first recording of John Cage’s large scale composition for 3 recorder players. The Trio Dolce wrote Cage for permission to perform Solo with Obbligato Accompaniment on three alto recorders, one octave higher than the prescribed range. In a letter from March 1987 Cage replied: “Of course you may use the 3 alto recorders. I am glad that you are playing that piece.” They performed it on July 1988 with Cage in attendance. Cage’s enthusiastic reaction to this performance encouraged Trio Dolce t…
Epigram And Evolution: Complete Piano Works
These piano pieces were written at every turning point in Roger Reynolds’ creative life, marking his evolution. The music is driven by relentless attacks toward catharsis, but also bittersweet chords, and trembling, rolling, wandering or sweeping masses of sound. We feel as though we are being pushed around by forces beyond human imagination. This sense of being carried away by an uninterrupted undercurrent may be the image of the world we live in. The featured pianists are the legendary Yuji Ta…
Tracer - Chamber Works 1952-1999
Surround sound DVD. Earle Brown first encountered the work of Alexander Calder in 1948, whose mobile sculptures Brown saw as a visual embodiment of the variable (impermanent) aesthetic that he was striving to create. This Calder aesthetic stayed with Brown throughout his several stylistic shifts. Whether he was writing twelve-tone serial music (Music for Violin, Cello, and Piano), conceptual graphic scores (Folio and Four Systems), composed material open form scores (String Quartet, New Piece an…
Virtuoso Opera Fantasies, Paraphrases & Transcriptions
This new release marks the first collection of Alvin Curran’s major works for piano solo. It also marks the first release in Mode’s Edition Yvar Mikhashoff, a series documenting the great artistry of the late pianist. Yvar Mikhashoff was a champion of new and neglected music — his unique style revealed new facets and insights to everyscore he played. The full scope of his pianistic brilliance will be showcased in Mode’s comprehensive Edition YvarMikhashoff, including solo composer recitals, fou…
The Art of the Curved Bow, Vol. 1
The Curved Bow, or BACH Bow, gives string-players the unique ability to play up to all four strings simultaneously — an impossibility with today's bow. Some believe that the curved bow was used during Bach's time, in the 20th century it was championed by the likes of Albert Schweitzer. It is a device with incredible potential for new and old repertoire, shedding new musical light on the works in which it is employed. Michael Bach has been playing with the curved bow for many years, continually d…
Yvar Mikhashoff Plays Alvin Curran: Piano Works
This new release marks the first collection of Alvin Curran’s major works for piano solo. It also marks the first release in Mode’s Edition Yvar Mikhashoff, a series documenting the great artistry of the late pianist. Yvar Mikhashoff was a champion of new and neglected music — his unique style revealed new facets and insights to everyscore he played. The full scope of his pianistic brilliance will be showcased in Mode’s comprehensive Edition YvarMikhashoff, including solo composer recitals, fou…
Made In America: The Complete Works Of William Russell
** 2021 Stock ** William Russell was, along with his friends John Cage, Henry Cowell and Lou Harrison, one of the seminal figures in modern percussion music. Russell composed his landmark percussion during the 1930s, eventually abandoning composition to work in jazz and settle in New Orleans. He was the first composer in the western tradition to integrate African, Caribbean and Asian instruments along with found objects and the influence of jazz into his work, all the while maintaining a distinc…
Wolpe in Jerusalem
** 2021 Stock. Deluxe packaging in slipcase, including essays by Austin Clarkson and Yuval Shaked, and historical photos. Liner notes in English, German, French and Hebrew ** In 1931, Stefan Wolpe escaped from the growing Nazi threat, eventually arriving in Vienna to study with Anton Webern. When the Austrian authorities threatened to deport him back to Germany, he left and eventually settled in Jerusalem in 1934 where he began to teach composition and direct the choir at the Palestine Conservat…
The Echoing Green
** 2021 Stock ** Like Morton Feldman, whose music he acknowledges as an influence Walter Zimmermann (b.1949) is fascinated by the relationship between painting and music, and how material of an apparently simple nature played by apparently “normal” instruments is capable of almost infinite subtlety. Frankfurt’s HCD Ensemble are also members of Germany’s infamous Ensemble Modern. They are joined here by the superb violinist Peter Rundel and cellist Michael Bach. Wüstenwanderung [Wandering in the …