Sonata / Equalisation
1992 release ** "I’ve long been interested in the extension of instrumental resources by electronic means, so when the Equale Quintet invited me to write a piece for them I decided to write in a part for a sixth player controlling a range of devices which would extend the sound of the five brass instruments. The title Equalisation is a slightly ironic reference to the technique, often used in rock music recording, of filtering a sound in certain ways to heighten its effect. Officially, the filte…
Frames that lean, pictures that roam
'Frames that lean, pictures that roam’ is a collection of instrumental works by Ailie Ormston for tape, electric guitar, cello and double bass. This ensemble of instruments achieves a complex sound ranging from fully electronic (tape) to fully acoustic (strings), with the guitar occupying space in-between. The freeing of fixed material is the common thread throughout these six works – riffs and motifs are established before being reinvented and reimagined, bending and twisting within the bounds …
The Snow Is Dancing
300 numbered and signed copies. 180 gr. Clear Vinyl. 'The Snow Is Dancing' is the new album by musician Arturo Stàlteri. A true homage to snow, its lightness and purity. Inspired by Claude Debussy's composition of the same name, the Roman pianist within this work guides listeners on a diaphanous and enchanted sound journey, in which the piano becomes a diary capturing subtle emotions and moments of wonder: “I have always loved snow. An impalpable white blanket that seems to erase every imperfect…
Actions – Remarks: John Cage’s Variations
John Cage’s Variations and the expansion of the score, sonic materials, space, and the environment. Book edited by Cat Hope and Lindsay Vickery, including CD recording of the 8 John Cage ‘Variations’ (1958–76), recorded by the Australian ensemble Decibel.
Harpsichords
Tip! "Three harpsichords in various states of disrepair were kindly offered to me by Leeds Conservatoire. I accepted, and a memorandum of understanding was swiftly drawn up. The offer was made under the condition that I might make some music from them, given my penchant for infirm instruments, and their conventional worthlessness to anyone wishing to use them for their intended purpose. There seemed to be an auspiciousness surrounding these harpsichords, the stories they might reveal, and more i…
Computer Music From The Outside In
*2024 stock* A 1983 Folkways release, Computer Music from the Outside In showcases three composers narrating the ideas and processes behind their computer music compositions, as well as the compositions themselves. The first two pieces are by Barton McLean: “Etunytude” is an etude-like piece made of gradually changing harmonic sounds, and “The Last Ten Minutes” is meant to be an abstract representation of the devastation of “the last nuclear holocaust.” “The Whistling Wind,” by Karl Korte, is ba…
A Different View
*2024 stock* Contrabass (double bass) solo virtuoso Bertram Turetzky performs seven solos on the contrabass in this 1981 release. Using bow, plucking strings, tapping on the instrument’s wood body, and employing a little audio technology, Turetzky demonstrates the full range of musical sounds that can be produced on the contrabass. His repertoire on this recording includes a piece dedicated to him (“The Last Contrabass in Las Vegas”), two of his own compositions, and the Lennon-McCartney ballad …
musique noire
Julia Purgina’s works tell musical stories. Abstract stories, which usually initiate her working process. It is her goal “to write works that are clearly located in the present through their musical language and by speaking of the present, but which both touch people in their innermost being and force them to reflect. In a way that would be ultimately timeless,” said the composer in an interview for the Ludwigsburger Kreiszeitung. Through the musical description of mysterious characters, clouds …
Works for the Ever Present Orchestra Vol. II
Works for the Ever Present Orchestra Vol. II continues Black Truffle’s documentation of the late work of legendary American experimental composer Alvin Lucier, who sadly passed away in 2021 at the age of 90. Like the first volume of the series, the two works recorded here were written for The Ever Present Orchestra, an ensemble founded in Zürich in 2016 to perform Lucier’s work exclusively. At the core of the music Lucier wrote for the ensemble is the electric guitar, an instrument he began to e…
cubes
*Limited Edition Handmade CDR in cardboard string sleeve with liner notes and album art.* "cubes (2020) commissioned, interpreted and recorded by Erik Carlson and Greg Stuart, is a set of instructions for constructing sound and recording events. The score consists of 24 “cubes,” rectangular figures containing various graphics, which are the building blocks of sound for the piece. Throughout the process of realization, Erik and Greg devised and structured these building blocks depending on variou…
Sound Plantings
Jonas Gerigk is a double bass player who is active as a composer/performer in the fields of improvised music. In addition, he collaborates in projects of contemporary composers and is involved in the realization of their works. A main focus of his work deals with the term Explorative Music. He is doing intensive research on the expansion of the sound spectrum of the acoustic double bass. With a physical as well as technical approach and the use of objects he explores the variety of timbres of hi…
Tête-à-tête
Over the course of a nearly 50 year romantic and creative partnership sound artist Annea Lockwood and the late pioneering electronic composer Ruth Anderson have shared space on a number of significant releases of early electronic and tape music, including Charles Amirkhanian’s trailblazing 1977 anthology of women electronic composers New Music for Electronic and Recorded Media, a 1981 split LP on Opus One, a 1997 CD for Phill Niblock’s XI imprint, and 1998’s Lesbian American Composers compilatio…
Lava
Lava describes a premordial state of flux, the transmutation of one material into another through a streaming of intensely concentrated energy. Molten fragments of electroacoustic sound are transformed live from brass and percussion instruments to create a sonic landscape that unfolds with a geologic sense of time. Chris Brown, San Francisco based composer, pianist and electronic instrument builder, studied with Gordon Mumma, David Rosenbloom and William Brooks. His work has been described in pr…
Swing Bridge; Sizzles
This release brings together two works by Alvin Lucier centered on the pipe organ, a perfect instrument for Lucier’s compositional practice. Both are first recordings.“Swing Bridge” was commissioned by this record’s ensemble, the Australian Art Orchestra, for the Melbourne Town Hall Grand Organ. The score requires that specific pipes be removed from the organ and run into three specially constructed offset chests, each accommodating two pipes (six pitches total). These pipes are manipulated by t…
Enso: Strings & Percussion
*In process of stocking* "Cologne bassist and composer Stefan Schönegg seems drawn to sound without end, a vibrating mass that crawls like a glacier toward the infinite. He’s used the moniker Enso for five recordings now, and although each album has featured a shifting group of collaborators, his vision has persisted without distraction. Enso: Strings & Percussion, which was recorded following a performance with the same ensemble as part of Cologne Jazzweek in September of 2021, introduces a new…
Enso: Strukturen
*2022 stock. In process of stocking* The world slowed down immeasurably in 2020 as the Corona virus pandemic spread across the globe, and Cologne bassist and composer Stefan Schönegg applied that shift to his own music. “I developed a deep longing for reduction and deceleration—in music and in life,” he says. Indeed, Strukturen, the latest transmission from his ensemble Enso, is marked by a Zen-like serenity. Since launching the project back in 2016 Schönegg has embraced minimal materials for th…
Plays La Berge | Greenstone | Pluta | Wooley
*In process of stocking* The second release of the trio T.ON - Matthias Muche (trombone), Constantin Herzog (double bass) and Etienne Nillesen (extended snare drum). This time T.ON presents four fixed media commissioned compositions by Anne La Berge, Madison Greenstone, Sam Pluta and Nate Wooley with talkboxes, bells and tubes, which were performed in four churches of Gottfried Böhm.
Nachthelle (Works By Johannes Fritsch | Oxana Omelchuk | Simon Rummel)
*2022 stock.* Actually, the CD "Nachthelle" should have been a concert for the 80th birthday of Johannes Fritsch (1941-2010). Because of Corona, it now became a CD. Luck in misfortune. Johannes Fritsch was a composer, improviser, violist, author, publisher, organiser and, last but not least, professor of composition at the Musikhochschule in Cologne, where his class was always open to guests over the years, also from the field of improvised music. The present publication contains the pieces "Vio…
Works By Carl Ludwig Hübsch
The Multiple Joy[ce] Orchestra presents its new CD "works by Carl Ludwig Hübsch" with all kinds of illustrious musicians from Cologne (and non-Cologne)!
Earis
*2022 stock* In November 2020, stuck in cologne, Elisabeth Coudoux composed this pieces – more close to her own intuition. These ideas are a direct result of a conceptual processes that matured over the span of many years, shaped by the individual sound and the personalities of the musicians involved. 12 short sonic islands teem with abstract, experimental sounds that don’t shy away from melody or formal play. Earis - The ear behind the iris - the idea of seeing without words, of forming a music…