This historic collection gathers together the four seminal solo albums recorded by Alvin Curran (b. 1938) in the 1970s. Two, Fiori Chiari Fiori Oscuri and The Works, are making their first appearance on CD. Author-critic Tim Page, an early advocate of these works, writes, 'Curran weaves electronic technology, an occasional acoustic instrument, voices and musique concrète ('found' music) into a multi-hued tapestry of sound. He holds these dissimilar elements together with a compelling subliminal musical consciousness; the listener never feels that Curran is deliberately being clever, or that he is out to impress, shock or self-consciously 'expand the musical language'. Curran's eclecticism is not willful; his sounds are there because they fit, and they convey a subtle and ingratiating sense of mysticism. These challenging, multi-faceted compositions manage, through their very catholicity, to synthesize and perfect a striking new musical syntax uniquely Curran's own. 'Songs and Views from the Magnetic Garden' (1973), 'Fiori Chiari Fiori Oscuri' (1974), 'Canti Illuminati' (1977), 'The Works' (1976).
'I am happy to stand again in front of all these free-wheeling tone paintings and look back - embracing both their concrete and their purely ephemeral, abstract qualities -while reflecting on how much these four seminal works determined the music I made afterward, similarly inspired by the rhythms, colors, and eternal durations of nature and the immediacy and knowledge of making music with anything at hand.' Alvin Curran
"this music is thoughtful, amusing, erotic, whimsical, angry, honest, sometimes honestly uncertain. A proper slice of life." Gramophone
