Ellen Reid — the Pulitzer Prize-winning composer and sound artist renowned for her “ineffably moving” (LA Times) works that span opera, sound design, film scoring, avant-pop, and so much more — announces Big Majestic, a stunning new album out August 30 via Amsterdam Records / Eclipse Projects. It’s a transformative and meditative work that finds Reid exercising her towering compositional command and casting her unique voice into fresh shapes as it traverses the worlds of ambient, jazz, post-rock, and minimalism. Accompanying the album’s announcement, Reid shares the album opener and title track “Big Majestic,” a swelling and regal overture for the breaking dawn that features Reid’s monolithic synth performance.
Big Majestic assembles music from Ellen Reid Soundwalk, a GPS-enabled work of public art that reimagines urban parks as interactive soundscapes. Soundwalk premiered in New York's Central Park, and expanded to urban parkland around the world, including Los Angeles's Griffith Park, London's Regent's Park & Primrose Hill, and Tokyo's Ueno Park. It won acclaim not only for its inventive premise and enveloping execution — The Washington Post praised it as “an intoxicating musical adventure” — but for its newfound utility during the socially-distanced height of the COVID-19 pandemic.
However, with Big Majestic, Reid proves that these works stand on their own divorced from their site-specific presentations, and arranges them to provide an immersive and cohesive arc. Influenced by the likes of Brian Eno, Nala Sinephro, Kamasi Washington, Air, and Floating Points, Reid is bold and graceful, bringing placid atmospheres into ominous complication with the subtlety of the sun moving across the sky. Vivid and evocative, these works capture the essence of the urban oases that inspired them with a magical realist flair.
To bring these disparate sonic locales to life, Reid calls upon a cast of luminaries from across the musical spectrum to deliver indelible performances. Kronos Quartet soar above desert vistas on “West Coast Sky Forever,” Shabaka Hutchings launches into kaleidoscopic shakuhachi and tenor saxophone meditations on “Spiritual Sun” and “Primrose Hill,” James McVinnie embarks on an electrifying synth organ epic on “Blue Sky | Mirrored Glass,” and the otherworldly voice of Lisel beckons the listener into the unknown on both renditions of “Pavilion In The Trees.” At times mystical and psychedelic or solemn and reverent, Big Majestic is a generous and transportative record. Throughout, Reid revels in the freedom of space and the power of gesture — crafting a marvellous and versatile work that does justice to these beloved and wondrous natural sanctuaries.
usicians:
Kronos Quartet
Shabaka Hutchings, shakuhachi & saxophone
Alex Sopp, flute
Joshua Rubin, clarinet
Rachel Drehmann, horn
Riley Mulherkar, trumpet
Sidney Hopson, percussion
Kyle Poole, drums
Lisel, voice
Ashley Jackson, harp
James McVinnie, synth organ
Mathis Picard, piano
Ellen Reid, synthesizer
Mona Tian, violin
Nadia Sirota, viola
Gabriel Cabezas, cello
Russell Hall, bass
