Archivi categoria: Musica

The newly obtained freedom of the spirit

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Gubaidulina’s entire piano output belongs to her earlier compositional period and consists of the following works: Chaconne (1962), Piano Sonata (1965), Musical Toys (1968), Toccata-Troncata (1971), Invention (1974) and Piano Concerto “Introitus” (1978). Some of the titles reveal her interest in baroque genres and the influence of J.S. Bach.

The Piano Sonata is dedicated to Henrietta Mirvis, a pianist greatly admired by the composer. The work follows the classical formal structure in 3 movements: Allegro (Sonata form), Adagio, and Allegretto. Four motives (pitch sets) are utilized throughout the entire sonata, which also constitute the cyclical elements upon which the rhetoric of the piece is constructed. Each motive is given a particular name: “spring”, “struggle”, “consolation,” and “faith.”

There are two elements in the primary thematic complex of the first movement: (1) a “swing” theme, characterized by syncopation and dotted rhythms and (2) a chord progression, juxtaposing minor and major seconds over an ostinato pattern in the left hand. The slower secondary theme introduces a melodic element associated with the ostinato element of the previous theme. In the development section, these sets are explored melodically, while the dotted rhythm figure gains even more importance. In the recapitulation, the chord progression of the first thematic complex is brought to the higher registers, preparing the coda based on secondary theme cantabile element, which gradually broadens. The second movement shifts to a different expressive world. A simple ternary form with a cadenza-AB (cadenza) A, the B section represents an acoustic departure as the chromatic figurations in the left hand, originating in section A, are muted. In the cadenza the performer improvises within a framework given by the composer, inviting a deeper exploration of the secrets of sound. It consists of two alternating elements- open-sounding strings, stroke by fingers, with no pitch determination, and muted articulation of the strings in the bass register-separated by rests marked with fermatas. The third movement is constructed of 7 episodes, in which there is a continuous liberation of energy accumulated during the previous movement.

Musical expression in this work is achieved through a variety of means. Rhythm is a very important element in the construction of the work, articulating a distinct rhetoric, as well as in the development of the musical material. Exploration of a wide range of sounds, within the possibilities of the instrument, involving both traditional and nontraditional methods of sound productions are another important mean.

Some examples of the nontraditional sounds produced are a glissando performed with a bamboo stick on the piano pegs against a cluster performed on the keyboard, placing the bamboo stick on vibrating strings, plucking the strings, glissando along the strings using fingernail, touching the strings creating a muted effect.

Two distinct aspects of the sonata-the driving force and the meditative state-can be seen through the architecture of the work as portraying the image of the cross. The first movement is related to the “horizontal” line, which symbolizes human experience while the second movement reflects the “vertical” line, which represents man’s striving for full realization in the Divine. The meeting point of these two lines in music happens at the end of second movement, and that reflects transformation of the human being at crossing this two dimensions. The third movement “celebrates the newly obtained freedom of the spirit”.

[from wikipedia]

Anagamin

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Nel Buddismo Theravada, Anagamin significa “uno che ritorna una sola volta”, cioè qualcuno che è sfuggito al ciclo delle morti e delle rinascite ed è destinato a reincarnarsi soltanto una volta ancora, prima del Nirvana [Britannica online].

Dal punto di vista musicale, si tratta di un brano per 12 archi composto nel 1965, una meditazione intorno a una sola nota, tema caro a Giacinto Scelsi.

Questa volta la nota centrale è il SIb che si riflette anche nell’accordatura del due violoncelli, l’uno innalzando la corda più acuta, LA, a SIb, mentre l’altro abbassa di un tono il DO grave.

Multiplying Real

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coverThe new album by Vladislav Makarov “Multiplying Real – Multicello”, (c) makART rec. 038

Makarov is a pioneer free improvised music in Russia, the known cellist-experimentalist, this is a solo work, but not quite usual. 20 short pieces recorded with using the usual analog delay, but with mass author’s preparations such as the objects in strings, wooden, bamboo and plastic sticks, combs, straightedges of the miscellaneous format, as well as makarov’s branded receiving playing on cello as on guitar, referring us from hard-rock to technic great english musician Derek Bailey. The album as a whole carries the experimental character, but many acceptances Makarov used repeatedly above-ground performances. All the pieces have a different invoice and expression, but collected in conceptual album, subordinated powerful direction of the author. Many the tracks can cause the shock and perplexity, but the electric cello here sounds as whole orchestra in spirit of avantgarde composer Xenakis or Stokhausen. Stylistic and genre of the work it is difficult to define, it obviously much broader notorious free improvisation, but is an colours by the palette all radical styles our time from freejazz, avant-rock up to noise and drone…

Download here

Some excerpts

On a Windy Day

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“Written in 2003, On a Windy Day was inspired by wind chimes in Buddhist temples set deep in the mountains of Korea, where I used to visit as a child. I vaguely remember one afternoon hearing the chimes start to ring so softly and randomly that at first I didn’t even notice them. Then the wind got gustier and gustier, and the chimes got louder and faster along with the sound of leaves on the trees surrounding the temple, eventually creating this mass of loud, intense, intricate sound. Then, as soon as the wind calmed down, everything went back to its serene surroundings, yet left me with all those tingling sounds lasting in my ears.

“To emulate this experience, I wrote a descriptive score for metallic percussion and had it performed live a few times by various players; the end result was never satisfactory. However, as soon as I heard John Hollenbeck’s incredible interpretation of this score in a studio, I was more than ecstatic. An idea came to me to add Ikue Mori’s unique electronic sounds and bring even more depth and surrealism to the piece. The final recording is better than I’d ever imagined and feels just like revisiting that windy day from my long-gone childhood.”

[Okkyung Lee]

Okkyung Lee (b. 1975) is a composer and cellist whose music fuses her classical training with improvisation, jazz, traditional Korean music, and noise. Lee was born and raised in Daejon, Korea, and attended arts schools in Seoul. In 1993 she moved to Boston, Massachusetts, where she studied at Berklee College of Music and with Hankus Netsky at the New England Conservatory of Music. Since relocating to New York City in 2000, Lee has been very active in the downtown music scene, performing and recording with artists such as Derek Bailey, Nels Cline, Anthony Coleman, Shelley Hirsch, Eyvind Kang, Christian Marclay, Thurston Moore, Ikue Mori, Jim O’Rourke, Zeena Parkins, Marc Ribot, Elliott Sharp, and John Zorn, among others.

  • Okkyung Lee – On a Windy Day (2003), for percussion and electronics

Retroscan

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Chris Brown‘s (b. 1953) music stems from the intersection of many different musical traditions and styles, including classical music, traditional Indonesian, Indian, Afro-American, and Cuban musics, and contemporary American experimental music. He has worked extensively with electronics, from amplified acoustic devices and analog sound modification to custom-made interactive computer systems. Collaboration and improvisation have played a significant role in the development of his work.

This [Retroscan] is the final section of a larger solo work Retrospectacles, in which the whole range of sounds possible from the piano, including sounds made directly on the strings, the frame, as well as the keyboard, provide sources for live electronic transformation by an interactive computer program. The music is a narrative about memory: each sound evolving out of the last, each playback with constantly varying pitch/time of sounds that have recently passed.
[Chris Brown]

 

  • Chris Brown – Retroscan (2003), for piano & live electronics
    Chris Brown, piano, live electronics

For Irving Lippel

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For Irving Lippel è una composizione del 2004 di John Link (1962), compositore di Boston, allievo di Elliott Carter, aperto a varie esperienze: ha composto lavori per diversi media (orchestra, formazioni cameristiche, jazz ensembles, rock band e sistemi elettroacustici).

Questo brano è una fantasia che esplora le suggestive potenzialità della combinazione chitarra – vibrafono.

S. Francesco prega gli uccelli

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Oggi ci occupiamo di Lewis Nielson (che giovane non è, essendo nato nel 1950) e di una sua composizione per orchestra del 2005, chiamata St. Francis preaches to the birds.

Lewis Nielson’s compositional influences include the music of Luciano Berio, Edgard Varèse, and Iannis Xenakis. He is also heavily influenced by a wide range of philosophers including Edmund Husserl, Karl Marx, and Ludwig Wittgenstein, as well as painting, poetry, and film.
Grants and awards for Nielson’s music include the Cleveland Arts Prize, Delius Trust, Groupe de Musique Expérimentale de Bourges in France, Ibla Foundation of Italy, International Society of Bassists, Meet the Composer, and National Endowment for the Arts. Nielson taught for 21 years at the University of Georgia in Athens, and since 2000 he has been on faculty at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, where he is director of the composition division. His work is recorded on the aca Digital, Albany, Capstone, Centaur, innova, and MMC labels.

Di questo brano l’autore scrive

“The piece is one long phrase. The single ‘phrase’ is kept in motion (perhaps suspension is a better word) through layering and elision of material within the layers … [There is a] gradual transformation from pitched, to less-pitched, to essentially non-pitched material in the solo violin part which, in turn, radiates in widely varying and sometimes very surprising ways throughout the sub-groupings and ‘sections’ of the ensemble.

“The piece is also like a funnel, or thresher, collecting seemingly disparate material, combining it and recombining it, turning one kind of music into another, winnowing out some aspects of an idea and transforming it into something new, resulting a continuous overlapping of ideas … Alternately in support and in contrast to the solo violin music, the other instruments also make musical contributions of their own, even in the act of assimilating or transforming themselves in light of what the soloist provides.

“Two general concepts govern structural growth: communication (or lack or inability thereof) between the soloist and the various ‘sections’ of the ensemble … and transformation of musical material within and between instruments and sections. The work is a long conversation among many individuals and groups, aiming less for a convenient sense of dialogue or dependent relationship between soloist and the rest than for the maintenance of a balance within the various musical ‘languages’ generated. […]

“While I do not intend any kind of direct correlation, the actual legend of St. Francis and his sermons to the birds … can provide, by way of analogy, some approaches to the workings of the piece and some various ways to listen to it … Whether or not one believes other aspects of the St. Francis legend, it’s clear that he sought to hold the birds’ attention, and that they were as eager to understand him as he them. Equally, as he listened to them he took away knowledge of a kind that resists codification while being very meaningful to him. […]

“It will be noted that the work concludes in an unusual manner: to wit, with the soloist leading the ensemble and the conductor seated, playing celesta with the percussionists. Besides making an historical ‘tip of the hat’ to the original leadership functions of the Baroque solo concerto, the soloist at the end embodies the catalytic and transformational agent he has been all along. […]

1987

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Un breve ma affascinante brano di Anna Clyne, giovane (nata nel 1980) compositrice inglese trapiantata a New York.

Di 1987, per flauto, clarinetto, violino, violoncello e nastro, composto nel 2008, l’autrice dice soltanto

Memories tucked away and tangled in threads of beads in the corner of her glass box.

 

Dea Varanus

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coverMatúš Mikula, aka 900piesek, è slovacco, uno dei giovani musicisti elettroacustici europei che creano una sorta di science fiction ambient con un po’ di nostalgia degli anni ’70.

L’album, dal titolo Dea Varanus, è pubblicato da Test Tube ed è scaricabile qui.

All four tracks emanate sound through a dense and foggy underwater-like world… as if we were in a different dimension. Audio data is served to you using computers and machines from another time. Referencially, this is ambient electronics circa 1970’s, while some keyboards sound definitely like Vangelis, Blade Runner period, which is actually very appropriate.

Dear listener, we recommend the use of headphones throughout this journey, as the fine subtleties of the atmospheric and environmental audio pieces you’re hearing will surely gain much detail simply because of their use.
This is a ‘vintage modern classic’, with drones. Enjoy.

[Pedro Leitão]

Excerpts: Ra

Eleven Echoes of Autumn

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George Crumb – Eleven Echoes of Autumn (1966) for violin, alto flute, clarinet, and piano.

Eleven Echoes of Autumn was composed during the spring of 1966 for the Aeolian Chamber Players (on commission from Bowdoin College). The eleven pieces constituting the work are performed without interruption:

  1. Echo 1. Fantastico
  2. Echo 2. Languidamente, quasi lontano (“hauntingly”)
  3. Echo 3. Prestissimo
  4. Echo 4. Con bravura
  5. Echo 5. Cadenza I (for Alto Flute)
  6. Echo 6. Cadenza II (for Violin)
  7. Echo 7. Cadenza III (for Clarinet)
  8. Echo 8. Feroce, violento
  9. Echo 9. Serenamente, quasi lontano (“hauntingly”)
  10. Echo 10. Senza misura (“gently undulating”)
  11. Echo 11. Adagio (“like a prayer”)

Each of the echoes exploits certain timbral possibilities of the instruments. For example, echo 1 (for piano alone) is based entirely on the 5th partial harmonic, ehco 2 on violin harmonics in combination with 7th partial harmonics produced on the piano (by drawing a piece of hard rubber along the strings). A delicate aura of sympathetic vibrations emerges in echoes 3 and 4, produced in the latter case by alto flute and clarinet playing into the piano (close to the strings). At the conclusion of the work the violinist achieves a mournful, fragile timbre by playing with the bow hair completely slack.

The most important generative element of Eleven Echoes is the “bell motif” — a quintuplet figure based on the whole-tone interval — which is heard at the beginning of the work. This diatonic figure appears in a variety of rhythmic guises, and frequently in a highly chromatic context.

Each of the eleven pieces has its own expressive character, at times overlaid by quasi-obbligato music of contrasting character, e.g., the “wind music” of the alto flute and clarinet in echo 2 or the “distant mandolin music” of the violin in echo 3. The larger expressive curve of the work is arch-like: a gradual growth of intensity to a climactic point (echo 8), followed by a gradual collapse.

Although Eleven Echoes has certain programmatic implications for the composer, it is enough for the listener to infer the significance of the motto-quote from Federico García Lorca: “… y los arcos rotos donde sufre el tiempo” (“… and the broken arches where time suffers”). These words are softly intoned as a preface to each of the three cadenza (echoes 5-7) and the image “broken arches” is represented visually in the notation of the music which underlies the cadenzas.