Reissues
Fontana mix-feed
Rare and now long out of print LP, originally released on Mass Art, performed and realized by Max Neuhaus. Technically, this LP consists of four realizations of John Cage’s 1958 Fontana Mix, an indeterminate graphic score originally intended to be used for a tape piece, with or without additional instruments. To say that, though, is not really to capture the unique nature of this music, or the unique nature of percussionist and electronic music pioneer Max Neuhaus’ take on Cage’s material.…
Genocidio 20
Italian composer maurizio bianchi (1955) produced his first tapes of noise in the early 1980s, at the peak of the industrial scene, but his chaotic dissonant orgies harked back to the musique concrete of the 1950s, despite similarities with Nocturnal Emissions, Metabolist, Whitehouse, early Throbbing Gristle.
Morendo
1990 release. Six compositions by the German composer Mathias Spahlinger: ("Morendo" for orchestra), ("Yon Hier" for string quartet), ("Vier Stücke"), ("Entlöschend"), ("Storung" -- electronic music), ("Sotto Voce" -- choral work).Mathias Spahlinger is a composer. His compositions play out in the area of tension encompassing the most diverse musical influences and style directions: Spahlinger’s works portray conflicts for which there are no defined models as such, between Renaissance and jazz…
Complete "La Grima"
"La Grima (Tears) was performed on August 14, 1971, at the Genyasai festival in Sanrizuka, Japan. The first six minutes or so of this performance can be heard on the omnibus LP Genya (released on CD in 2004). This CD presents the complete, unedited version of the performance.As if to slash through the audience's scornful, jeering reaction to Takayanagi's opening remarks, the group launched into a fiercely convulsive performance. Despite having a variety of objects thrown at them, Takayanagi and …
Live independence
Another previously unreleased archive release from Takayanagi, the premier Japanese free-guitar stylist. Recorded live in 1970, waves of trademark feedback abound, but also some more serene segments with flute, freedom atmospherics, etc. Not as overwhelmingly brain-bombing as his previous release on the label (PSF 41), but definitely another important piece in the crucial documentation of Takayanagi's career.
Call in the question
Takayanagi is the premier free-guitarist legend in the Japanese underground story. This CD features unreleased material by the master, from 1970. The sound is heavy improv, with Takayangi's explosive feedback wail in prominent display. As fine an introduction to his music as you could hope for (most of his albums from the '60s & '70s are impossible to track down)
Eclipse
Originally released in 1975 as an LP on Iskra Records (ISKRA-001). 'First session 1: Gradually Projection'. 'First session 2: Gradually Projection'. 'Second session: Mass Projection'. New Direction Unit are Masayuki Takayanagi: electric guitar. Kenji Mori: alto saxophone, flute, recorder. Nobuyoshi Ino: bass. Hiroshi Yamazaki: drums, percussion. Recorded by Mikio Aoki in Tokyo, March 14, 1975. Includes liner notes in English by Alan Cummings.
Axis another revolvable thing. Vol.2
Originally released in 1976 as an LP on Offbeat Records (ORLP-1009). Masayuki takayanagi New Direction Unit. Masayuki takayanagi: guitar. Kenji Mori: reeds. Nobuyoshi Ino: bass, cello. Hiroshi Yamazaki: percussion. Recorded live at Yasuda Seimei Hall, Tokyo, September 5, 1975. Remastered by Tsutomu Suto. 'Fragment I: Gradually Projection'. 'Fragment IV: Mass Projection'. 'Fragment V: Mass Projection'. All compositions by Masayuki takayanagi. Includes liner notes by Teruto Soejima in Japanese an…
Axis another revolvable thing
restocked! Originally released in 1975 as an LP on Offbeat Records (ORLP-1005). 'Fragment II: Gradually Projection'. 'Fragment III: Percussion Solo'. 'Fragment VI: Mass Projection'. All compositions by Masayuki takayanagi. Masayuki takayanagi New Direction Unit: Masayuki takayanagi: guitar. Kenji Mori: reeds. Nobuyoshi Ino: bass, cello. Hiroshi Yamazaki: percussion. Recorded live at Yasuda Seimei Hall, Tokyo, September 5, 1975. Remastered by Tsutomu Suto. 'One begins to see--and hear--each sound…
Cartridge Music, Cifre, Four Systems
Works performed and arranged by Italian composer and Nuova Consonanza member Mario Bertoncini in 1970. Includes pieces by Cage ("Cartridge Music" for amplified "small sounds"), Earl Brown ("Four Systems" for prepared piano), and Bertoncini ("Cifre" for two or more pianos).
Erratum musical
the principle of musical erratum is simple: you choose a keyboard - any keyboard - you draw each note at random - no note can be struck twice, but all are struck - the resulting whole is played without any particular modulation, "a uniformity de rhythm, anaccentuation" says Duchamp.tThe premises of minimal and aleatory art are thus expressed in "the green box", published in 1934 (although the writings date back to 1912-15). to do this, we chose to use a piano (a bösendorfer)7 VARIATIONS ON A DRA…
The seasons: Vermont
The Seasons: Vermont is a soundscape of Vermont as charted through the changes of its yearly soundings. It is a composition in four parts (Summer, Autumn, Winter, Spring) for magnetic tape collage with an unspecified live instrumental/vocal ensemble. Though the actual composing of the music was completed between 1980 and 1982, it is the realization of a ten-year composition project. Goldstein listened closely and became attuned to what was the particular sound quality of each season in Vermont. …
Live With The Birds
The ensemble (4 of them) performs on an aluminium strip suspended from a rubber band (for subtle pitch shifting). As with Stockausen's Mikrophonie 1 this single source is bowed, scraped, beaten, tapped, stroked and so on. The Kanary Grand band comprises some 40 birds of various breeds who, sing along. N sum, varieties of interesting gong like drones with realtime fully interactive birds. A must. 3-way gatefold digipack, 12pp booklet with thoughtful essay. Limited art edition of 1000 copies.
20 Jahre Inventionen V - live electronic
The live electronics that Nono worked with for the first time in the early 1980?s at the Freiburg Experimental Studio also serves the musical displacement: the music moves away from clear spatial and timbral assignations. Due to electronic processing, the sonic characteristics of both instruments, bass flute and cello, can hardly be recognized. Tones and gestures are lengthened into seeming infinity and move in space
A Carlo Scarpa · A Pierre · Guai Ai Gelidi Mostri
** Original 1990 edition LP, comes with a black and white 12-page booklet ** Edition RZ’s vinyl edition of three works by Luigi Nono - a pivotal figure of the Italian avant-garde - all composed and recorded in the mid ‘80s. A lesson in fine-tuning acoustic perceptions, meant for focussed reception in keeping with Nono’s concept of “new listenings”: "This no longer means revolutionizing the entire linguistic system ie. a subversive attack on the institution of music; rather it means progressively…
Acousmatrix 7
Seventh volume in the Acousmatrix series. "In 1955, Luciano Berio and Bruno Maderna founded a Studio di Fonologia at a Milan radio station; it was the first electronic music studio in Italy. Berio became very active there, organizing concerts and also publishing a new music journal, both under the name Incontri Musicali. Berio explored the frontiers of sound, particularly vocal sound, thanks to his association with Cathy Berberian. She was willing and able to produce a remarkable variety of exte…
Didascalies
The idea of bringing together Rencontres fortuites, Didascalies and Tautologos III - two recent works for piano, viola and electronics, and one open-ended work - imposed itself at a concert at the Boendael Chapel in Brussels, where Collard-Neven and Royer performed Didascalies, with Ferrari attending. A few months later, we found ourselves in the legendary Brème studios, having to deal with the waiting, the Tonmeister's mood swings, and Luc, sick, having a hard time with long commutes and schedu…
Tautologos and other early electronic works
Luc Ferrari is among the best known of the early electronic music pioneers. He was director of the Groupe de Recherches Musicales from 1959 to 1960, working closely with Pierre Schaeffer, and his music played a decisive role in defining the range of musique concrète. But he went further to become one of the most radical composers of his time, and this CD, with its incisive character and exceptional sounds, marks the starting point for his artistic evolution. The compositions include 'Etudes aux …
Acousmatrix 3
Third volume in the Acousmatrix series. "A lovely work of electro-acoustic music by one of the French pioneers of musique concrete, Petite Symphonie Intuitive Pour un Paysage de Printemps ('Little Intuitive Symphony for a Spring Landscape') recreates the composer's experiences during a climb toward sunset on the Causse Mejean, a high plateau in the Massif Central, including his recollection of a shepherd's flute and its reverberations across the landscape. The flute sounds and multiple echoes co…
Cycle des souvenirs
2023 restock. First ever release of a large scale electroacoustic piece five years in the making that revisits numerous periods from Luc Ferrari's five decades of work. From the composer's liner notes: "I have been composing a new series of works under the general title Exploitation des Concepts. The point is to take concepts I have been experimenting with throughout my entire life as a composer, and to put them to use in every possible direction: in instrumental as well as electroacoustic music…