Reissues
Étude sur les Mouvements rotatoires / 24 Préludes
The master of partial tones: Ivan Wyschnegradsky continued Scriabin's harmonic principles and (successfully) searched for new tone colors.
Prometeo, Tragedia dell\'ascolto
One of the most significant musical works of the twentieth century is now available in an archive-quality recording. Only now, using surround-sound technology can the twenty-six channels be balanced out and distributed, spatially and dynamically, with minute accuracy across the five speakers: a time-consuming and fascinating task, evoking the optimist Sisyphus. With this double SACD, André Richard and Peter Hirsch’s team, who had already worked on the first performance of the then new Prometeo i…
Quando Stanno Morendo
Works of art are often triggered by private events. Sarà dolce tacere (1960), for example, was written on the occasion of the 40th birthday of Bruno Maderna, Nono's (former) teacher and close friend; and also in 1960 Nono wrote Ha venido for his daughter's first birthday. Djamila Boupachà (1962), ¿Dónde estás, hermano? (1982) and Quando stanno morendo (1982), on the other hand, are clearly expressions attributable to the politically involved, the committed cosmopolitan Nono.
Variazioni canoniche sulla serie dell\' op. 41 di Arnold Schoenb
"All my works always start out from a human incentive: an event, an experience, a text in our lives leads to my instinct and my conscience and wants me to bear witness, as a musician and as a man." This is how Nono, in 1960, described his motivation as a composer, the incentive inducing him to speak up through his music. His opus 1, the Canonic variations on the series of op. 41 by Arnold Schönberg, is based on the twelve-tone series used in Schönberg's composition; it actually takes effect in t…
Das atmende Klarsein
Researching into the fringe ranges of hearing, and actually going to the limits: electronics – live or prerecorded – was one of the tools employed by Luigi Nono in pursuance of this object. In his work Das atmende Klarsein he moreover endeavored to expand the ability of listening: "Waking up the ear, the eyes, human understanding, intelligence, is what is essential today," the composer, also a politically aware man, observed in the early 1980s. Das atmende Klarsein "is a key work of Nono's final…
Three Voices
This piece is sung by the Swiss “deep voice”, Marianne Schuppe in trio with herself, a feat made possible by playing back recordings of her own voice. This is not minimal music; melodic lines arise, sensual, beautiful, and undoctored, swaying like a lullaby, yet boosting the overall rhythmic intensity. There cannot be many works which demand of the soloist such careful timing, intense concentration and voice control.
For Bunita Marcus
For Bunita Marcus was written in 1985. "This work, which I have dedicated to Bunita Marcus, [...] deals with the death of my mother, and with the notion of a slow death. I simply didn't want the piece to die. So I used this unwillingness compositionally in order to keep the piece alive, like a patient suffering from an terminal disease, for as long as possible." (Feldman) It is not the loud raging, the last furious revolt of a dying human being that Feldman depicts here, but a slow nodding off a…
Triadic Memories
In other works, such as For Philip Guston, which continues for several hours, Morton Feldman actually would go beyond the bounds of possibility, also overtaxing the concentration of both his musicians and his audience. Nevertheless, like these other words Triadic Memories also requires contemplation, listening without restlessness. Though perhaps not intended by Feldman, a strong contemplative element is inherent particularly in this composition, settling like a haze on the tones that seep in sl…
Violin and Orchestra / Coptic Light
Morton Feldman dedicated a whole series of compositions to the relationship between solo instruments and the orchestra: after Cello and Orchestra (1972), Piano and Orchestra (1975), Oboe and Orchestra (1976) and Flute and Orchestra (1977/78) his Violin and Orchestra (1979) marks the conclusion of these "relationship works." The variety of sound accumulated around the violin, or through the violin, in less than an hour's time ranges from delicate whispers to cantilenas in rich tones and sharp rep…
Orchestral Works & Chamber Music
In the early 1970s Feldman increasingly turned his attention to works for orchestra, in most cases combined with a solo instrument, like Piano and Orchestra (1975). One aspect that was important to him in all of these works was a research into sound, an "unceasing effort to create, by way of exclusion and integration, by operating with colored projection surfaces and various spatial levels, a kind of self-supporting structure elastic enough to take up the exactly fixed initial impulse and contin…
Piano and Orchestra, Palais de Mari, Piano
In the early 1970s, Feldman increasingly turned his attention to works for orchestra, in most cases combined with a solo instrument. The compositions dating from this period include, among many others, Cello and Orchestra (1972) or Oboe and Orchestra (1976). One aspect that was important to him in all of these works was a research into sound, an "unceasing effort to create, by way of exclusion and integration, by operating with colored projection surfaces and various spatial levels, a kind of se…
Crippled Symmetry
Music and carpets? Well, the latter's slightly irregular patterns certainly inspired Morton Feldman to write his Crippled Symmetry (1983). "With Feldman, composing more and more takes on the nature of writing a diary; he weaves and knots his sounds like the Turkish nomads make their carpets, the ones he admires so much for their asymmetrical deviations in pattern." (Ulrich Dibelius) It is just these deviations from the standard, that which is slightly shifted, slightly out of place, that Feldman…
Neither
An opera? An anti-opera? A monodrama? Whatever it may be: Neither (1977) marks the meeting of the kindred artistic souls of Samuel Beckett and Morton Feldman.
The Rara Requiem
Added to these are bits and pieces of first names of real people and opera characters, and numerous quotes from older works by Sylvano Bussotti – who combines it all to a work that is also a grand opera: The Rara Requiem was written as the third part (acts 4 and 5) of Lorenzaccio (1968-72), the story of a renaissance man. A pandemonium of sounds, the subtotal of Bussotti's previous oeuvre – and the celebration of a proud renaissance man who confronts death with the courage of contempt. "The musi…
Eisenberg
Archaic sounds, songs as psychodramas, plowing through the depths and shallows of the orchestra: experience Globokar's cosmos of original, intense music.
Perspectives Musicales
Well ... Mr. P.C. C.P. has clearly taken a peek at my “Holy Grail” list - in it, nestled amongst such unattainable classics as Karel Appel’s “Musique Barbare”, Paul Boisselet’s “Le Robot”, and Il Gruppo Nuova Consonanza’s ill-fated Cinevox-label album is the LP in question; a split release featuring a pair of pieces made at the tail-end of the 1960s at the GRM by Jacques Lejeune and Christian Clozier, respectively. Released as part of EMI / Pathe Marconi’s mythical “Perspectives Musicales” serie…
Recorded Music For Film, Radio & Television: Electronic SBH 3073
Recent claims made re: Tod Dockstader’s absence from the public eye since releasing his owl-label lps in the late 60s are somewhat off. In 1979 this and another “companion” volume were released on the boosey & hawkes library music label; consisting of a spate of sound-queues made by mr. dockstader for production/documentary use. this sounds like no other dockstader recording you’ve heard. There are a couple of “fat brass synth-fanfares for sci-fi” kind of queues, but for every one of those there…
Urvarte - Noir - Blau (electronic music)
There’s not much in the way of documentation on the Early Danish Electronic Music scene other than the Else-Marie Pade, Jørgen Plaetner, and Gunner-Möller Pedersen discs on DaCapo - all fantastic sets full of wonder, but mired in a certain air of government-funded academia (i.e. Men / Women in lab-coats working in sterile studios; having to demonstrate their yield / progress in regular / weekly iterations to secure further funding; being afraid to take it finally and fully out). This item should…
Estórias para Voz, Instrumentos Acústicos e Eletrônicos
One composition from 1967 (the first), the rest from the late 70s. Here we have patiently forming compositions of a variety of means, although to be fair, the order in the title is clearly in order of importance. The voice is the most important element in three of the four compositions (the second is mostly ambient and dominated by piano and atmospherics), while the last is most likely where Jocy draws the electronics (although their appearance is fleeting and only used as window dressing). Thro…
Greek Electronic Music
A collection of late 60s pieces from 6 hellenic composers; only one of which even rates a single listing in the Hugh Davies book (that would be Michael Adamis.) See that on the cover? its the patch-bay of an ems vcs3, possibly the most legendary/covetable analogue synthesizer.Here is an exchange that i’ve fabricated as a possible explanation of how this record came to be:Adamis: “I’ve just come back from London and look what i have: it’s an EMS VCS3. It’s a(n) Electronic Sound Synthesizer.”Ada…