Today I interviewed saxophonist Tim Berne in Brooklyn for a feature article that will appear in the next issue of Signal to Noise Magazine, the journal for improvised and experimental music. In a beleaguered market for print publications, particular for music magazines, I’m so pleased that StN editor and publisher Pete Gershon is working hard to keep the publication alive. The hope is that there will be two issues this year.
Snake Oil, Tim’s first CD on ECM as a leader (he’s supported David Torn and Michael Formanek on other ECM releases) is out this week (2/7/12). A quartet date, the personnel includes Berne playing alto saxophone, Oscar Noriega playing clarinet and bass clarinet, Matt Mitchell playing piano, and Ches Smith playing drums and a number of other percussion instruments.
An enthusiastic collaborator who has been in many more bands than a blog post can contain, Berne brings a “chamber jazz” aesthetic to this project, with gig-tested charts that have rigorous compositional structures but leave plenty of room for improvisation and on-the-spot inspiration. A gracious interviewee, Tim spoke about this project and several other current endeavors. Pete has given us a generous word count (how often do writers get that these days), and I’m really looking forward to covering Snakeoil and a host of other subjects in the article.
Below, you can see another incarnation of this group, the Los Totopos band, playing live via YouTube. We’ve also included dates for the tour Berne is undertaking in support of Snakeoil on both sides of the Atlantic.
One of the best recital discs I heard in 2011 did not feature an instrument typically associated with the genre. Contrechant is a disc comprised of all contemporary works performed by Swiss clarinetist Reto Bieri. All solos: no piano accompaniment or contributions from other instrumentalists. But the proceedings are hardly monophonic or monochromatic. Even Luciano Berio’s Lied (1983), which opens the disc with a phrase or so gently articulated “song-like” melody, does not remain a “single line” piece for long: this texture is complicated by repeated note ostinati and wide-ranging leaps. While Lied isn’t as hypervirtuosic as the clarinet Sequenza, it proves to be an elegant introduction to the rigorous material that will be found on the disc, as well as the formidable technical skill and focused interpretative powers possessed by Bieri. Indeed, Contrechant is a showcase for the clarinet’s versatility and its extensive repertoire of extended techniques.
A case in point is “Lightshadow-trembling,” by Hungarian (now residing in the US) composer, conductor, and clarinetist Gergely Vajda. The piece spends a great deal of its duration requiring the clarinetist to perform pedal tones in conjunction with a compound melody and copious trilling, creating a far denser texture than many listeners would assume possible when presented with the mislabel “single line instrument.” After this sustained, breathless (or, rather, circular breathed) flurry, late in the piece, Vajda allows the clarinetist to attack single sustained notes: the resultant starkness is startling. This was the first piece I’ve heard from Vajda: I look forward to hearing more.
One of Vajda’s teachers, the acclaimed composer and conductor Peter Eötvös, contributes a very different work: Derwischtánz. It is lyrical and questing, with beautiful runs that start in the chalumeau register and cascade up to long, sustained, pianissimo notes in the instrument’s upper register to end each phrase. A few trills at the work’s close seem to serve as foreshadowing for Vajda’s later perambulations.
“Let me die before I wake,” by Salvatore Sciarrino revels in extended techniques, such as multiphonics and whistle tones. But these never seem gimmicky; instead they give the clarinet an otherworldly, “sci-fi” ambiance that is quite haunting. Virtuoso oboist and composer Heinz Holliger knows a thing or two about wind instruments. His Contrechant (2007)cast in five short movements, takes up where Sciarrino leaves off, putting the clarinet through its paces, including extraordinary measures: slap tonguing, extended glissandi, vocalizations, microtones, and altissimo register squalls. It is a bracing, yet dramatically compelling, ultra-modernist composition. More reflective, although still possessing considerable angularity and a wildly shifting demeanor, is Rechant (2008), a through-composed companion piece.
This is Bieri’s second recording of Elliott Carter’sGra (1993), one of the ‘early’ works of the now 103 year-old composer’s ‘late’ period. It is one of a number of relatively brief single movement piecess that Carter penned during the 90s and 00s and, I believe, one of his best. In Gra, for the most part Carter eschews the special effects employed by the aforementioned composers; he instead displays absolute command, both of the instrument’s idiomatic capabilities and of a rigorously compressed harmonic and gestural language. The piece’s exquisite pacing and, for Carter, relatively new found directness of expression, make it one of the great works for solo clarinet. Since his first recording of the piece, Bieri’s interpretation has grown, is ever more sure-footed and specific in all of its details: I’m glad he recorded it a second time. Let’s hope ECM invites him back to make another CD. Pairing him with one of the label’s many talented pianists could make for a deadly duo disc.
For the rest of 2011, among our coverage will be “notable” recordings, highlighting some of our favorites for the year that we haven’t as yet covered on File Under ?.
Duo Gazzana
Five Pieces: works by Takemitsu, Hindemith, Janacek, and Silvestrov
ECM New Series CD
Despite its already impressively deep catalog, Manfred Eicher’s ECM still finds new perspectives and new interpreters to present on the imprint’s recordings. Sisters violinist Nastascia Gazzana and pianist Raffaella Gazzana have been performing together since the 1990s. But they waited until 2011 to make their recorded debut, in a chamber recital CD. Surprisingly, they are the first Italian chamber group to perform on an ECM release!
The disc features works by four different Twentieth century composers, all of whom are displayed in works that operate from the more traditional side of the stylistic spectrum. Even Toru Takemitsu’sDistance de fée, from 1951, early in his catalog, displays the composer’s affinity for Impressionism overtly, with only hints of the experiments and polystylism to which he would later turn. Paul Hindemith’s E major Violin Sonata, cast in two movements, features a buoyant allegro movement followed by a sober langsam tinged with melancholy, which abruptly shifts to a brilliant finale. Both the piece, and its interpreters, are able to adjust to these rapid changes of mood without it ever seeming unnatural. Instead we are given a succinct yet complete account of a sonata’a narrative arc – in exquisite miniature. It’s worth mentioning how the shifts in timbre elicited by Nastascia are luminously detailed throughout this work.
Inspired by the clangor and rigors of WWI and begun near the outset of that conflict, Leos Janacek’s Sonata for violin and piano is filled with its own poignant twists and turns. Understandably, it displays considerably more angularity and angst than the Hindemith, and both sisters really dig in to its brash gestures while providing a detailed account of its nuanced articulations ( an aside: both pieces were programmed side by side in 1923, with none other than Hindemith performing the violin part).
But wait, there are four composers: why’s the disc called “Five Pieces?” It’s the title of the last group on the CD, a set of violin/piano duos by Valentin Silvestrov. Although there is certainly an affinity between some of the Eastern European folk inflections found in both the Janacek and Silvestrov works, there is an even wider reaching retrospective quality in the Silvestrov that seems to encompass all of the styles presented on the CD. Indeed, it mines many of the veins of tonally oriented 20th century music, providing an elegiac and Neo-romantic viewpoint that never confuses genuine emotional resonance with bald sentimentality. Raffaella brings out a warmly resonant quality from the pieces’ harmonic progressions, all the while supporting with careful balance and phrasing the long-lined legato playing of Nastascia. And while one can find many grander musical statements in Silvestrov’s oeuvre, he has distilled some of his most affecting music in these five miniatures. Indeed, the lilting Intermezzo and Barcarolle movements are truly magical microcosms.
Displaying consummate musicality, featuring a fascinating program of repertoire that should be heard more widely, with sumptuous sonics to boot, Duo Gazzana’s debut is one of my favorite discs of 2011. Let’s hope the Gazzana sisters get right back into the recording studio with Mr. Eicher in 2012!
Composer Toshio Hosokawa (b. 1955) has been featured once before on an ECM recording, as one of three composers programmed on a recital disc by Thomas Demenga. Landscapes is his first portrait disc for the imprint. It features a number of fine performers who are ideal advocates for Hosokawa’s fluid and multifaceted musical language. The Munich Chamber Orchestra, led by Alexander Liebreich, has become a featured ensemble on ECM’s New Series. The quality of their interpretations here readily support the notion of them remaining a ‘house band’ for the Manfred Eicher curated imprint.
Hosokawa’s work combines the influences of Darmstadt school second modernity with elements from traditional Japanese (and Chinese) culture, ranging from gagaku (courtly ceremonial music) and the employment of traditional instruments to examples from fine art: calligraphy and landscape paintings. In works like Ceremonial Dance and Cloud and Light, one is impressed with how seamlessly these various, at times disparate, elements are synthesized. This is particularly evident on Ceremonial Dance, where acerbic harmonies combine with sliding tones to fashion a hybrid of East/West techniques that sounds truly organic and self-contained. Cloud and Light works from a similar palette. But here there is also an interesting juxtaposition of delicate sustained shô and string chords and thunderous low register outbursts.
In addition to participating in Cloud and Light, shô (mouth organ) player Mayumi Miyata is also featured on two other pieces on the disc. Back in 1993, Landscape V was originally scored for shô and string quartet. This updated version for larger ensemble works equally well; both renditions are hauntingly eloquent tone poems. Miyata takes a solo turn on Sakura für Otto Tomek, a work filled with slowly evolving complex clusters of harmony. Sakura’smeditative ambience is shadowed with portentous overtones, creating a rich showcase for the singular and fetching timbres of the shô.
Hosokawa has long been respected in both Japan and Europe. Of late, given the strong reception given Matsukaze, his second opera, in Berlin, his stock has risen considerably in the Euro Zone. One hopes that more American conductors and ensembles will take notice of Hosokawa, a composer with a compelling individual voice developing an impressive body of work. This recording should help!
On the blog tomorrow, we’ll be discussing Landscapes, Toshio Hosokawa’s first portrait CD for the ECM imprint. The new recording features an orchestral arrangement of this 1993 work, originally scored for shô and string quartet.
I certainly wouldn’t want to be compelled to prefer one to the other: Landscape V is a haunting tone poem in both its intimate and fuller incarnations.
Using jazz as source material for electronica/remixing is nothing new. In addition to hip hop samples by crate-digging DJs, and several one off collaborative projects, labels have gotten aboard and opened their archives. Blue Note has released several remix albums while, for their Blue Series, Thirsty Ear frequently pairs electronica artists with avant jazzers. The former releases more or less ause jazz recordings as fodder for sampling/remixing, albeit iconic fodder. The latter are often engaging and collaborative in nature.
Re:ECM takes what I would consider to be still a third approach to jazz recorded sources. Drawing upon ECM Records’ capacious vaults of treasures, it unleashes two of today’s abundantly creative electronic musicians, Ricardo Villalobos and Max Loderbauer. Given wide latitude in their selection of material, the duo draw upon sessions by several fine jazz musicians on ECM’s roster, such as John Abercrombie, Stefano Bollani, and Paul Motian. The ECM New Series is also represented by contemporary classical composers ArvoPärt and Alexander Knaifel.
The resulting two disc set of tracks is not made in the spirit of remixing choice ECM tracks in toto; nor is it meant to be a sample-fest that spotlights the artists rather than their sources. Instead, Villalobos and Loderbauer treat the recordings as compositional material: to be reworked and developed. Their approach is respectful; their manipulations made deftly and without the heavy-handedness one finds on some of the Blue Note remixes. Most striking here is the microscopic lens brought to details from the sources: breathy wind attacks, string noises on a harp, gently percussive articulations from a jazz drum kit. Indeed, some of Re: ECM’s best moments are accomplished via “addition by subtraction.”
While the artists themselves weren’t playing live for Villalobos and Loderbauer, there is a third presence on these recordings that bridges the gap between creators and recreators. Producer and ECM label head Manfred Eicher supervised the mastering of Re:ECM. Given his association with the source recordings the first time around, his involvement lends an air of authenticity to the proceedings. One can hear his presence as well. In virtually every respect, this sounds like an ECM disc: production values, sound world, ambience, and creative aesthetic.
Too many crossover projects end up feeling like a fish out of water. On the contrary, Re: ECM is the real deal. Here’s an idea: next time around, get Villalobos and Loderbauer into the studio with some ECM recordings artists. The possibilities are tantalizing!
Erkki-Sven Tüür
Strata ECM Records New Series 2040 CD
In his recent music, Estonian composer Erkki-Sven Tüür has dispensed with some of the polystylistic juxtapositions of his earlier works in favor of a methodical, mathematically devised approach he calls “vectorial writing.” While this approach does seem to create a more unified sensibility to his harmonic language, the results never seem mechanical. Rather, Tüür’s recent music is capable of a passionate immediacy that’s often quite refreshing. Yet at the same time, he’s unafraid of employing swaths of dissonance and creating intricate formal designs.
Strata, Tüür’s Sixth Symphony, is an intense work, brimming with dynamic power. Emerging from icy verticals and bustling counterpoint are myriad swells of knotty cluster chords and fierce, angular melodies, which gradually build to explosive orchestral climaxes. Strict constructionists may quibble with calling a single-movement work a symphony; but then again, they’d have to argue with Lutoslawski on that score too! Strata certainly tends to favor the heft and developmental formal trajectory of a large-scale symphonic work rather than the episodic/programmatic elements of a tone poem. In a confident and detailed performance, the Nordic Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Anu Tali, makes a strong impression here in their debut for the ECM imprint.
Strata is paired with Noesis, a double concerto for the sibling duo of violinist Carolin Widmann and clarinetist Jörg Widmann. Their solo lines emerge from a slowly evolving, prevailingly ominous orchestral backdrop, which is only occasionally brightened by shimmering chords from pitched percussion. The Widmanns are given numerous dovetailing duets and ebullient solo turns which contrast with their stark accompaniment. Eventually, the orchestra gives chase, adding propulsive countermelodies, jagged repeated string chords, sustained dissonant wind clusters, and eruptive brass and drums to the proceedings. Once again, Tüür has fashioned a labyrinthine journey in a single formidable and fascinating movement. Recommended.
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Upcoming US performances of music by Erkki-Sven Tüür:
February 24, 25, 26 & March 1 – New York, NY – NY Philharmonic with Paavo Järvi conducting NY premiere of “Aditus”
(details)
February 24 – Washington, DC – Portrait Concert with New Tallinn Trio at the Phillips Collection
Symphony No. 4 “Los Angeles” (2008)
I Con sublimità
II Affannoso
III Deciso
Fragments from Kanon Pokajanen (1997)
ECM New Series 2160
Estonian composer Arvo Pärt turned 75 yesterday. His record label ECM Records is celebrating his three-quarters of a century with two new recordings.
Pärt’s 4th Symphony is a long-anticipated follow-up to his 3rd – which was written back in 1971! In the interim, the composer has moved from a modernist style to an idiosyncratic version of minimalism; one the composer calls the “tintinnabuli” style of composition. From bell-like resonances and slowly moving chant melodies, Pärt has crafted a personal compositional language of considerable appeal. And while this has included a number of stirring instrumental works, such as Tabula Rasa and Cantus in Memory of Benjamin Britten, more recently Pärt has been known for his choral music. His return to symphonic form is thus an opportunity to explore his mature language in a different milieu.
Perhaps in part as an acknowledgement of the home of the orchestra commissioning the Fourth Symphony – the “City of Angels” – Pärt decided to use a text as a formative – if subliminal – device in his preparations of the piece: the Canon of the Guardian Angel. Thus, while this is certainly not merely a transcription of a vocal piece – it sounds idiomatic and well orchestrated – there is a certain chant-like quality which demonstrates the symphony’s affinity with the vocal music and chant texts that are Pärt’s constant companions.
The live recording is of the work’s premiere in Disney Hall in LA. Salonen and the LA Phil give a muscular rendition of the piece, emphasizing its emphatic gestures while still allowing for the symphony’s many reflective, meditative oases to have considerably lustrous resonance. And while one can certainly hear a palpable connection to Pärt’s chant-inspired tintinnabuli pieces, the symphony also allows for dissonant verticals and melodic sweep that recalls both Pärt’s own Third Symphony and the works of other 20th century symphonists, from Gorecki to Shostakovich.
Perhaps in order to clearly attest to the connection between text and symphony, the disc is balanced out with a fifteen-minute serving of fragments from one of his important choral works from the 1990s: Kanon Pokajanen. The composer has pointed out the relationship between the canon that was his reference point for the symphony and the texts upon which the latter choral work was based.
He says, “To my mind, the two works form a stylistic unity and belong together. I wanted to give the words an opportunity to choose their own sound. The result, which even caught me by surprise, was a piece wholly pervaded by this special Slavonic diction found only in church texts. It was the canon that clearly showed me how strongly choice of language preordains a work’s character.”
Kaljuste and the Estonian Chamber Choir are seasoned handlers of Pärt’s works, having made a number of recordings of his music. They do not disappoint here, providing a performance that juxtaposes the ethereal eternity found in the texts with an earthy and corporeally passionate rendering of the music.
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In order to further fete Pärt, ECM also plans a lush reissue of their landmark 1984 recording, Tabula Rasa, complete with a generous accompanying book with newly commissioned essays about the composer.
Henri Dutilleux: D’ombre et de silence
Robert Levin, piano
Ya-Fei Chuang, piano
ECM New Series CD 2105
Born in 1916, Henri Dutilleux remains one of France’s most important living composers. In the first recording to feature his work on the ECM imprint, pianists Robert Levin and Ya-Fei Chuang tackle his piano music for both one and two pianos. The works collected here are an eloquent overview of Dutilleux’s gradual refinement of his musical language.
His early Sonate (1946-8) is perhaps best described as post-Impressionist, inhabiting the lush yet fluid world of Ravel and Debussy with several knowing glances at the rhythmic vitality of Francis Poulenc. Already by 1950, Dutilleux is exploring birdsong in a sympathetic manner to Oliver Messiaen in the brief but charming “Blackbird.” Conversely 1976′s Figures de résonances demonstrates an awareness for innovations by the Postwar avant-garde. This work, which features both pianists, is a stirring essay in sostenuto verticals, with dramatic outbursts followed by an intricate unfolding of reverberating overtones. A collection of preludes from the 1970s and 80s, as well as 1981′s Petit air à dormir debout distill this intricate vocabulary into limpid miniatures. The preludes combine moments of exquisitely shaded delicacy with ferocious outbursts.
With ardent performances and captivating sound throughout, D’ombre et de silence serves as an excellent introduction to this talented elder statesman’s music.
Singer/pianist/composer Judith Berkson recently released Oylam, her second CD overall and debut recording for the ECM imprint. It is a reinforcement of the eclectic yet compelling musical aesthetic displayed on her first recording, Lu-Lu (Peacock); but it also displays considerable growth.
Though she’s still a young talent, I became aware of Berkson some time ago. In the early aughts, Berkson studied with microtonal maestro Joe Maneri (recently departed – terribly missed) and contemporary classical specialist soprano Lucy Shelton at the New England Conservatory of Music. In a happy instance of syncronicity, I interviewed Maneri during that same time period. During the course of our conversation, he pointed out Berkson as a special talent.
Nine years later, she’s more than confirmed his assessment. Although she plays and performs primarily in conventional tunings, Berkson retains an interest in angularity and spiky harmonies that demonstrates her thorough training in both modern music and avant jazz. Berkson’s originals are a rigorous amalgam of both of these idioms. She also displays a keen interest in Jewish liturgical and folk music. One of the standouts of the disc is a rendition of the folksong “Hulyet, Hulyet.” Here, she overdubs her voice to create a choir of Berksons: a fetching sound world, all the more inspiring because she doesn’t ‘overindulge’ in overdubbing, only doing it here.
Oylam includes unconventional yet engaging renditions of two standards – Porter’s “All of You” and Gershwin’s “They Can’t Take that Away from Me.” While she frequently reinvents the melodies of these chestnuts, one never feels that she does violence to their overall structure: quite the contrary. I enjoyed imagining the original tune in counterpoint while hearing her refreshing versions.
Berkson is a fine pianist; the album is bookended by two fine instrumentals: “Goodbye Friend No. 1″ and Goodbye Friend no. 2.” She’s also keen on exploring other keyboards, including synths and (for the first time here) Hammond organ. But often her instrument of choice is Fender Rhodes electric piano. While in other hands the Rhodes can sound a bit ‘carbon-dated’ to a particular era of vernacular music, it doesn’t appear that Berkson has selected the instrument to channel this repertory. Rather, her voice melds very attractively with the Rhodes, often creating a seamless dovetailing of instrumental and vocal lines.
The CD also includes an evocative version of Franz Schubert’s “Die Leiermann.” This lied is the final song in Winterreise and perhaps serves as a tantalizing foretaste of things to come. Berkson is currently at work on a large-scale project incorporating lieder. While I hope that she keeps the various strands of musical styles displayed here in the mix – originals, standards, Jewish liturgical/folksong – the thought of Berkson tackling a large-scale lieder project seems quite promising. Stay tuned.
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Here’s Berkson performing live one of the tracks that appears on the ECM recording, a trope on Jewish traditional music entitled “Ahavas Oylam.”
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