Experimental Music

CD Review, Experimental Music, File Under?

Jessica Pavone – Clamor (CD Review)

Jessica Pavone

Clamor

Out of Your Head Records

 

Violist Jessica Pavone has made a detailed study of microtones, excelling as well at techniques such as harmonics, bow pressure, and multi-stops. Clamor, her latest recording for Out of Your Head Records, combines all of these in four extended solo works.

 

As the title of the recording suggests, there is a fair amount of dissonance and noise. Not so on the first track, “Neolttwigi,” in which sumptuous multi-stops, modal melodies, and the exploration of multiple overtone series combine in one of Pavone’s most memorable compositions to date.

 

“Nu Shu,” split into Parts 1 and 2, is an exuberant celebration of noise, with the aforementioned pitched components saturated with dissonance and unpitched string sounds, bow pressure chief among them. Pressed harmonics are redolent with upper partials. Pavone frequently plays them in the piece. When fleet melodies take over, they too are distorted, at times sounding more like electric guitar than viola. Tapping and scratching various places on the viola yields percussive effects. A held bass note with ascending glissandos is a reverberant refrain. While much of this suite explores noise, not all of it is loud. One of the best passages is a soft presentation of scratchiness alongside descending glissandos and repeated notes. Its finale, however, is filled with exuberant yawping fortissimos.

 

The final track is “Bloom,” on which Pavone explores the language of folk music in a doleful, Celtic-sounding, opening tune. Ornamented with filigree and supported by a drone in the bass, it once again returns Pavone’s music to a more pitch-based palette. A squall of semitones interrupts the reverie, but the drone and tune soon return. Multi-stops and a placid ostinato then undergird high harmonics. Repeated notes animate the tune, but this is contravened by the persistent stillness of the rest of the texture. Swelling modal harmonies, once again capped off by dissonant verticals, provide a fascinating interlude that soon is interrupted by the opening drone and slower oscillations. As “Bloom” moves toward its conclusion, dissonances are juxtaposed against a different drone. At the height of the intensity, modal chords commingle with the more fraught elements, imparting a diverse sense of harmonic movement. “Bloom” ends enigmatically, on an accented, dissonant, high chord.

 

Pavone has distinguished herself as a talented soloist (and collaborator) and a dedicated investigator of extended materials. Clamor is her best to date, with daring contrasts and  not a note – or scratch – out of place. It is one of my favorite recordings of 2023.

  • Christian Carey

 

by Christian Carey
Birthdays, Composers, Contemporary Classical, Experimental Music, File Under?

Happy Birthday Jürg Frey

Sequenza 21 is pleased to wish a Happy Seventieth Birthday to Jürg Frey. The Swiss composer has been a member of the wandelweiser collective since the 1990s, and his work exemplifies its aesthetic. For fifty years, Frey was also a well-regarded clarinetist.

 

We will celebrate with coverage of two of Frey’s recent recordings.

 

Borderland Melodies

Apartment House

Another Timbre

 

Apartment House has become something of an ensemble-in-residence for the Another Timbre label. The group revels in experimentation, taking special interest in living British composers, the New York School, and wandelweiser. Borderland Melodies includes three pieces featuring both clarinet and bass clarinet. Like much of his music, the compositions here explore “landscape,” not as a program, but as a musical vantage point. Thus, moment-to-moment events are organized in terms of long stretches in which rhythm, pacing, and harmony give a different sense of space. While discussing such intricate layers of sound, one cannot help but draw a parallel to the precision and thoughtfulness of Top casino’s zonder Cruks, platforms designed to provide a tailored gaming experience that adheres to the specific preferences of players while offering a sense of freedom and accessibility. The sound of the two clarinets together, played by Heather Roche and Raymond Brien, is lovely, perhaps serving as an homage to Frey’s own clarinet playing. In the title piece, they are accompanied by solitary piano notes and string harmonics. The idea of melody, while palpable throughout, is executed through compound melodies and attenuated Webernian utterances.

L’état de Simplicité is cast in four movements. Thrumming bass notes are offset by sustained pitches in movement one, Á la limiter du sens. Toucher l’air refers to the technique of vibrating the air moving through an instrument. The third movement features beguiling rearticulated verticals. The final movement, Les Zones neutres, juxtaposes pizzicatos with sustained winds, to which sometimes are added violin harmonics that make chords blossom. Moment, ground, fragility is a half hour long, shorter than some others of Frey’s pieces, but long enough to get a sense for how he deals with a big compositional canvas. There is a noticeable economy of means, with repeated pitches and intervals moving around one another like an orbital process. Percussion is part of the ensemble here, providing a slow tactus that, rather than feeling like a downbeat accent, is accompanied by isorhythmic structuring in the other instruments. Those who wish to start with a piece by Frey might consider Moment, ground, fragility as a point of entry.

 

Lieus d’ombres

3-CD box

Reinier van Houdt, piano

Elsewhere

 

“If I were a pianist, I would play my music like Reinier would play it.” — Jürg Frey

 

Frey has written a great deal of piano music. It has been performed by Dante Boon, Philip Thomas, and the pianist here, Reiner van Houdt. Lieus d’ombres was written over a long period of time, from 1984 to 2016. Yet the seven compositions are of a piece: Pianissimo, closely voiced verticals and single pitches that float at a slow and steady tempo. These are interspersed by section-punctuating silences. Changes in pacing then seem all the more significant. The language is primarily triadic, with shifts between pitch centers that retain the overall chordal spacings. It is a blissful listen.

 

-Christian Carey

 

by Christian Carey
Concert review, Contemporary Classical, Events, Experimental Music, Los Angeles

Urban Birds ’23 in Pasadena

Arlington Garden in Pasadena was the venue on Sunday, May 7, 2023 for Urban Birds ‘23, an afternoon of sunshine, synthesized sound experiences and live outdoor performances presented by Synchromy. A number of Los Angeles-based composers and performers were on hand and the audience was encouraged to simply wander through the garden to take in the sound installations and stop by the scheduled performances. The weather was perfect and the event program also listed “bird demonstrations by Wild Wings, crafting stations by local artist groups, and hands-on activities for all ages.”

Entering through the main gate to Arlington Garden and following the gravel footpath soon brings you to a clearing with chairs, benches, umbrellas and tables. This was the venue for Hornbill, a continuous sound installation featuring sustained ambient tones and a few high-pitched electronic beeps and boops. This was soft and calming, and conjured a convincing electronic metaphor for wild birds chirping in a garden. Further down the footpath was Feast + Famine, a demonstration of some live worms (zophobas atratus) capable of eating and digesting plastic. If you were brave enough to have a look inside, a few very small creatures could be seen crawling over some styrofoam flakes, apparently enjoying a hearty meal. A speaker emitted a sort of low gnawing and crunching sound that was actually the amplified chewing of the worms.

Nearby was an elegant performance by Sharon Chohi Kim who acted out the part of a bird in the wild. Her movements were slow and deliberate with eyes darting about as if on the hunt or wary of predators. Ms. Kim’s dress was long and loosely hung, suggesting folded wings at her side. Although brightly colored, she blended nicely into the garden underbrush as she stalked about. Kim issued bird-like calls that added to the convincing illusion. All of this was improvised in the moment and very effective. Ms. Kim deployed a graceful control of her movements and was truly channeling her inner bird.

Further on there was a demonstration of live owls by Wild Wings. It was hard to believe these birds were not mechanical, especially when they turned their heads almost full circle. The barn owl, in particular, seemed particularly dignified. Nearby was another sound installation, Twa Corbies, and this consisted of speakers mounted inside two wooden keepsake boxes that frequently emitted loud bird calls and squawks.

In a clearing at one end of the garden was Stellate Hexany Earth Chimes and this consisted of two tubular chime stands standing about 40 feet apart with two players at each. The chimes were fashioned from steel tubes and trimmed individually to pitches conforming to a Just Intonation tuning scheme. There was a written score for each of the four parts and the playing was synchronized by timer. Four for Twenty, composed by Daniel Corral, was the piece performed on these chimes. This began with solitary tones ringing out, each in turn, releasing sounds that seemed to hang effortlessly in the air. The tuning of the chimes and the careful striking with mallets produced a series of gentle and calming sounds. As the piece progressed, a call and answer pattern developed between the two chime sets that was very effective. The rate of striking the chimes increased gradually towards the finish and the garden air was filled with what might have been the ringing of distant church bells. After the piece concluded, Daniel Corral was available to discuss his techniques of chime construction and tuning as well as the interpretation of the notated score.

In another part of the garden, the fully electronic Nightjar:, by Kelly Heaton, was performed by Christina Lord. A beautifully crafted circuit board in the shape of a bird was the centerpiece of Nightjar:. This was populated with a number of electronic oscillators that randomly emitted bird calls from various species. These sounds were sampled and mixed in a PC using synthesizer software so that the performer could improvise the texture around the chirps, squeaks and squawks coming from the bird. The result was a surprising and convincing electronic sound picture that nicely captured the organic feeling of live birds calling in the wild. This was no doubt partly due to the power of suggestion – the electronic circuit board/bird sculpture was so appealing to the eye that its sounds were uncritically perceived by the brain as coming from a living bird. Even so, Nightjar: is an impressive combination of electronic craft in the service of musical art.



Urban Birds ’23 is a pleasant outdoor musical experience that will be all the more appreciated after the long and wet Southern California winter. Urban Birds ’23 moves to the Audubon Center at Debs Park, Los Angeles, for a repeat showing on Saturday, May 13

Audubon Center at Debs Park
4700 Griffin Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90031

Synchromy is:

Ashton Phillips, Carolyn Chen, Daniel Corral, Kelly Heaton, Cassia Streb, Tim Feeney, and Thadeus Frazier-Reed.

by Paul Muller
CD Review, Contemporary Classical, Experimental Music, File Under?

Ming Tsao – Triode Variations (CD Review)

Ming Tsao

Triode Variations

Ensemble Musikfabrik, conducted by Emilio Pomárico

Neue Vocalisten Stuttgart

Ensemble KNM Berlin, Stefan Schreiber, conductor

Kairos Music

 

Triode Variations is composer Ming Tsao’s third recording for Kairos, with another portrait CD on the way in 2024. It is a showcase of a relatively small timeframe, with pieces on it composed from 2016-2020. In his formative years Tsao trained widely, studying violin and viola with Ron Erikson, Guqin (Chinese zither) with Wu Zhao-ji, composition with Chaya Czernowin and Brian Ferneyhough, and electronic music with Mario Davidovsky. He ended up at University of California San Diego, where he received the Ph.D. in Music Composition. Subsequent to this, his music has been commissioned by prominent ensembles and featured at a number of festivals. Much of Ming Tsao’s work has premiered in Europe, and three German ensembles record it here. 

 

The composer uses highly intricate procedures, which are copiously described in the release’s liner notes. It involves using preexisting music, reversing and then modifying it to create something nearly unrecognizable to the original. Ming Tsao likens it to multiple palimpsests. Triode Variations (2019-2020) takes as its starting point Arnold Schoenberg’s Variations for Orchestra. Over the course of three movements, two interludes, and a postlude, Ming Tsao explores a complex web of angular lines. The Schoenberg layer occasionally is asserted, but only for brief fleeting moments. Triode Variations is played with fine detail and bold assurance under Emilio Pomárico’s direction of Ensemble Musikfabrik. 

 

The composer is fascinated with canonic procedures from the Medieval and Renaissance era, which is displayed in Das Wassergewordene Kanonbuch (2016-2017), in which intricate counterpoint is brought to play in each of the twenty puzzle canons. Once again, a reversal procedure is employed to further complicate the proceedings. The canons reference texts of Paul Celan, a twentieth century poet whose own cryptic procedures are an apt inclusion. Neue Vocalsolisten Stuttgart are required to perform extended techniques alongside complex linear interactions. Once again, the use of palimpsests successively glimpsed in the music is a fascinating technique that creates kaleidoscopic effects. 

 

Refuse Collection (2017), performed by the Ensemble KNM Berlin, conducted by Stefan Schreiber, is given an incisive, rhythmically taut performance. It is another reverse transcription of Schoenberg, this time his Begleitungsmusik zu einer Lichtspielscene, Schoenberg’s only film music. The music is refracted through a metric grid based on the poem Refuse Collection (2004) by J.H. Prynne. 

 

For those interested in the construction of music by Ming Tsao, consult the detailed liner notes essay on his compositional language. For those who prefer to listen without preconceptions, Ming Tsao’s music speaks for itself. 

 

-Christian Carey

 

 



by Christian Carey
CD Review, Contemporary Classical, Experimental Music, Los Angeles

Isaac Schankler – Because/Patterns

Aerocade Music’s Because/Patterns is an album of experimental music by composer Isaac Schankler. Three new works are featured and performed by top Los Angeles-area musicians. Each piece is the product of the relationship that develops between the acoustic instruments and accompanying electronic constructions. Schankler is perhaps best known as the artistic director of People Inside Electronics, an organization dedicated to ambitious and innovative uses of electronics in new concert music. This album marks the high level of his efforts in this area.

The first piece is Because Patterns/Deep State, with Aron Kallay on piano, Vicki Ray on prepared piano and Scott Worthington playing bass. This begins with an electronic track full of sharp rattling rhythmic sounds that alternate on both channels. Deep, booming bass sounds from Worthington occur at regular intervals, followed by a whirring sound that increases in loudness and finally dominates. Some quietly repeating piano notes slowly push their way into the texture, gaining quickly in volume and creating a nice rhythmic groove in the process. The whirring returns, accompanied by drumming and a variety of industrial sounds – humming, buzzing, clicking and rumbling – these are imposing, although not quite menacing. A siren is heard in the foreground, sustained and urgent, building a sense of anxiety.

Synthesized string sounds appear like the sunrise on a cool morning invoking a more hopeful and optimistic feeling. As the whirring and drumming recede, a light rain of appealing piano notes is heard and soon dominates to bring a welcome sense of cheer. The ominous electronic sounds, however, return to continue the pattern of alternating layers that rise and recede as the piece moves forward. The piano playing by Kallay and Ray is warm and lyrical – immediately recognizable as inspired by human creativity. The deep electronics are never menacing, but always stand apart from the music.

As the dark mechanical sounds recur, they evoke the regimented constraints of a modern existence. When the lighter piano notes appear with their optimistic tones and agreeable rhythms, we are reminded of those times when our humanity is allowed to prevail. These two states struggle for control, but neither seems able to completely displace the other. The persistence of optimism is the message here; life is never so grim that all possibility of hope is extinguished. Because Patterns/Deep State is an artful exploration of the contending forces present in our culture, and offers a powerful assurance of human resilience.

The second work, Mobile I, features violinist Sakura Tsai along with electronic accompaniment enhanced by spectral analysis. This opens with sustained notes in the violin followed by a pause and then some light skittering with pizzicato that builds tension. The sustained tones return, but are now accompanied by a pure electronic tone that shines like a cool beacon through the increasingly complex flow of phrases issuing from the violin. The electronic tones vary in pitch but never overwhelm, acting like a calm backdrop to the now frenzied passages expertly played by Sakura Tsai. The tension ratchets higher as rough, scratchy sounds evoke a convincing sense of suffering and agony. The electronics now become more animated and percussive, adding to the level of anxiety. The violin finally breaks out in a series of fast, nicely articulated phrases, as if sprinting towards freedom before fading at the finish. Mobile I artfully contrasts the vividly expressive sounds of the violin with more reserved tones from the electronics, a combination that, surprisingly. works to magnify the emotional response of the listener.

The final track is Future Feelings and features pianist Nadia Shpachenko. This opens with a lightly metallic wash in the electronics and swirls of strong piano notes. As the piece moves forward, the piano dominates, unreeling clouds of lovely phrases played with that characteristically sensitive Shpachenko touch. Although for the most part quietly atmospheric, some drama is occasionally added when the piano dips into the lower registers in a series of rapid, descending scales. Soft beeping tones – clearly electronic – enter from underneath, yet these seem perfectly at home embedded within the lush melodies and warm textures of the piano line. The extravagantly beautiful playing of Ms. Shpachenko almost steals the show, but the subdued electronic presence is memorable precisely for how much it contributes to the warm sensibility of this piece. Future Feelings is exquisitely expressive music, with just the right balance of masterful playing and superbly complimentary electronics.

Because/Patterns is remarkable listening and a new benchmark of just how highly evolved the combination of acoustic instruments and electronics has become in the service of musical expression.

Because/Patterns is available now via digital download from Bandcamp, Amazon, Spotify, and other retailers. A 12” vinyl record with a unique color or pattern combination and can also be ordered via Bandcamp.






by Paul Muller
CD Review, Composers, Contemporary Classical, Electro-Acoustic, Experimental Music, File Under?

Hearing Landscapes Hearing Icescapes – Lei Lang (CD Review)

Hearing Landscapes Hearing Icescapes

Lei Liang

New Focus Recordings

 

From 2012-2022, composer Lei Liang did a residency at the Qualcomm Institute at UC San Diego, where he is a full professor. At Qualcomm, Liang worked with scientists in a variety of disciplines –  software developers, robotic engineers, material scientists, cultural heritage engineers, and oceanographers – to infuse his music with ecological and ethnographic elements. The result, Hearing Landscapes Hearing Icescapes, are two electronic works that incorporate samples, folk songs,  and a few live musicians. 

Hearing Landscapes is an homage to Huang Binhong (1865-1955), a gifted landscape painter. The audio components of this electronic score were in part realized by analyzing the types of brushstrokes used by Binbong, and translating them into sound. Visual artists did further analysis of the painting using their own methodologies. There are three samples from 1950s China used successively in each of the piece’s movements: a hu-aer folk song performed by Zhu Zonglu, a renowned singer from northwest Qinghai Province, xingsheng (crosstalk) in the Beijing dialect by comedians Hou Baolin and Guo Qiru, and guqin performer Wu Jin-lüe playing “Water and Mist over Xiaoxiang.” Other sonic devices used by Lei Liang include a “rainstorm” made by dropping styrofoam peanuts in an open piano, and the distorting of spoken voices to create indecipherable “tea house chatter.”

 

It is fascinating to  learn of the roles of many integrated disciplines used to fashion Hear Landscapes. The musical results are compelling. In “High Mountain,” the “strokes” found in the melodic lines, passages of upper partial drones, and the piano storm, ebb and flow and set the stage for Zhu Zonglu’s singing. Movement 2, “Mother Tongue,” a reference to Lei Liang’s own preferred dialect, creates swaths of distressed, unintelligible speech alongside the banter of the two comedians. “Water and Mist” returns to the clarion harmonics and brushed melodies. Dripping water appears alongside Wu Jin-lüe’s elegant playing of the guqin. A passage that incorporates sustained strings follows, succeeded by a lengthy passage of  solo guqin and water sound receding until the piece’s conclusion.

 

Hearing Icescapes uses different source material, including recordings of contemporary performers: David Aguila, trumpet, flutist Teresa Diaz de Cossio, and violinist Myra Hinrichs. Oceanographers provide sounds they had recorded in the nearly inaccessible Chuckchi Sea, north of Alaska. It takes echolocation as a formal design, with one part of the piece indicating the “Call” and the other the “Response” of this phenomenon. Ice, wind, bearded seals, belugas, and bowhead whales create an extraordinary variety of sounds that, without this project, would be available to be heard by few humans. At over twice the duration of Hearing Landscapes, Hearing Icescapes is expansive, the first movement gradually unfolding from the cracking of thin ice to flowing water to an effusive whales’ chorus at its close. Throughout, crescendos and diminuendos of water sounds are accompanied by short whistles from whales. The live instruments are fairly subdued, playing sustained tones underneath the surface of the soundscape. 

 

The second movement begins with snatches of the main source material, a combination of the ice noises and whale song. The live instruments are then foregrounded, imitating the whale sounds in a response to the first movement’s mammalian outcrying. Hinrich uses bow pressure to create an imitation of the ice noises. Aguila is an imaginative interpreter of the more boisterous sounds from “Call,” and de Cossio mimics the whale whistling with considerable fervor. A pause, followed by falling ice, demarcates the movement’s structure. Once again, the whales take up their echolocation, this time in a virtual colloquy with the live instruments. The combined forces end the piece in thrilling fashion.

 

Artists are often, by necessity, so focused on short term deadlines for projects, that they don’t get to innovate. Lie Liang’s decade spent with his colleagues at Qualcomm Institute has resulted in considerable innovation and two significant works that resonate with cultural studies and ecology, while at the same time providing diverting music. Recommended. 

 

-Christian Carey 

 

by Christian Carey
CD Review, Electro-Acoustic, Experimental Music, File Under?, Pop

Radical Romantics – Fever Ray Returns (CD Review)

Radical Romantics

Fever Ray

Mute

 

It has been nearly six years since Plunge, Karin Dreijer’s last album under the moniker Fever Ray. Equally well known for their band The Knife, on which they collaborate with their brother Olof Dreijer, Karin has made distinctive electronic music for over twenty years. Their latest, Radical Romantics, is a welcome return. In gestation since 2019, it is some of the finest work released by the Fever Ray project.

 

Another welcome return is one of collaboration. Olof helped to produce some of the recording and co-wrote four of the songs, the first collaboration between the siblings in eight years. Other co-producers and performers include Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross (Nine Inch Nails), experimental artist and producer Vessel, Portuguese DJ and producer Nídia, Johannes Berglund, Peder Mannerfelt, and Pär Grindvik’s technicolor dance project Aasthma. Long-time collaborator, Martin Falck, joined Dreijer in creating an impressive visual corollary to the recording. Indeed, Radical Romantics is a project in which videos and artwork are a strong component, not the promotional devices that they so often are for other releases. 

 

The first four songs are a set written by Karin and Olof. “What They Call Us” started life some time ago as material for two unrealized movie soundtracks. Thrumming live drums alongside drum machine, an insistent synth riff, and electronic interjections demonstrate the number of iterations of the genesis of “What They Call Us.” However, this working approach is not uncommon on Radical Romantics. The end result, like much of the rest of the album, is music chock full of multifaceted layers, as well as far flung allusions in its lyrics. Another tune the siblings co-wrote, being supported by a video, is “Kandy.” It has an irrepressible “Whoo” vocal ostinato, an alto register lead vocal, and squirms with synth melodies. Tabla on “Shiver” and hand claps and a bass drum on “New Utensils” provide fulsome grooves. Both also feature modular synths that create a swarm of glissandos. Karin’s vocals encompass a variety of colors and superlative control. Gone is the stridency that typified some of their work in the Knife, replaced with a supple upper range and honeyed lower register. When they want to, as on “Even it Out,’ a steely edge appears.

 

The hit single, thus far, is “Carbon Dioxide,” on which Vessel helps to craft a club track with a soaring vocal by Karin and strings by Sakhi Singh and Seb Gainsborough. “Carbon Dioxide” includes an unusual tune, the Baby Elephant melody. Like many of Radical Romantic’s songs, the backstory recalls a diverse selection of inspirations and influences. Fever Ray has said they wanted the music to,  “Have the feeling of when you first fall in love …to be nice, happy, full of everything, extra everything. The Baby Elephant melody is the happiest melody of all time. The track contains wording from 1 Corinthians 13:1 because those words made a great impact when hearing them in Kieślowski’s Blue film. And a line from Anne Morrow Lindbergh’s, Gift from the Sea.” 

 

Another standout is “Even it Out,” on which Karin collaborates with Nine Inch Nails. Reverberant vocals create a texture over which a second line, a rousing chant, is placed. NiN supply a terse electric guitar, bending notes, and an alt-rock drum pattern. The song imagines settling scores with your child’s bully, a feeling many parents have likely had (hopefully, as here, it remains a fantasy). Reznor and Ross also assist on “North,” which Karin describes as “stillness after collapse.” As its title suggests, there is a chilly atmosphere, with whispered vocals, a syncopated rhythmic loop, and an architecture of overlaid synths. Mining their father’s record collection, Karin got to know Bob Marley’s music. On “Looking for a Ghost,” a line from Marley’s “Satisfy My Soul” appears alongside an unlikely compatriot – a Porno for Pyros snippet – as well as words by the eminent Swedish author Barbo Lindgren.

 

“Tapping Fingers” is a sad song, one that Karin suggests is the saddest song they have written, about trying to communicate with your partner, listening for a morse code message in their tapping fingers, repeated over and over again as they fall asleep. Vocals in octaves, a descending chord progression with fat bass underneath, and regular synth punctuations adorn the song. The final track is seven minutes long, but makes much with a small amount of material. “Bottom of the Ocean” consists of Karin performing repeating vowels that echo with long repeated bass tones underneath. It is a suitable denouement to cool down from an album of imaginative instrumentation and excellent songwriting. Recommended. 

 

  • Christian Carey
by Christian Carey
Concert review, Contemporary Classical, Experimental Music, Los Angeles

Southland Ensemble – James Tenney

After almost three years on hiatus due to the covid pandemic, the Southland Ensemble returned to the concert stage on February 3, 2023 to perform Harmonium, experimental music composed by James Tenney. The venue was Frankie, a large studio building deep in the heart of the warehouse district in Boyle Heights. The Southland Ensemble is known for performing historically significant music. In selecting works by James Tenney for this concert, they gave voice to perhaps the most influential West Coast composer of the last 30 years. Three pieces, averaging about 20 minutes each, provided a full hour of pioneering harmonies from a variety of sustaining instruments, all masterfully played by thirteen top Los Angeles area musicians.

James Tenney was born in New Mexico and grew up in Arizona and Colorado. He had a long and distinguished academic career that included the University of Denver, the Julliard School and the University of Illinois. Tenney studied with a number of acclaimed composers, including Edgard Varèse, Harry Partch and John Cage. He also spent time at Bell Labs working in electronic music and he authored a number of articles on musical acoustics, musical form and perception as well as computer music. He taught at the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn, the University of California and York University in Toronto. Tenney is probably best known in Southern California as the Roy E. Disney Family Chair in Musical Composition at Cal Arts where he influenced an entire generation of West Coast composers.

Tenney was a well-known composer and theorist and his many performed works were on the cutting edge of musical development during his entire career. His pioneering work in alternate tuning systems and their perception was the focus of this concert. The three pieces that were performed are all essentially extended studies in the expressive power of new harmonic vocabularies.

Harmonium #1 was the first piece on the concert program. This piece dates from 1975/76 and is scored for an ensemble of twelve or more sustaining instruments. The Southland Ensemble players consisted of a string bass, cello, euphonium, some violins, clarinets, saxophone and flutes. The players were scattered separately throughout the large expanse of the Frankie studio space with the audience around the edges. A single, extended violin tone opened the piece, soon joined by a flute and a second violin. The other instruments followed, entering at various pitches, and eventually forming a sustained tutti chord that lasted some ten or 15 seconds. The players used a stopwatch at their music stands to time the start and finish of each in a series of chords as the piece progressed. All of the chords consisted of sustained tones with a crescendo/decrescendo that added some dynamic movement.

The pitches for each instrument were from an alternate tuning scheme and were marked up on the player’s parts. An electronic tuner was also used by the musicians to find the indicated pitch when it was outside of the twelve-tone equal temperament convention. For the wind instruments this involved alternate fingerings and other extended techniques to attain the composer’s intended pitch. The result was a series of sustained chords lasting for several seconds that were comprised of unconventional pitches from various combinations and subsets of the ensemble. Listeners experienced a sampler of sounds from a new harmonic language.

The venue was a fairly large open space and the acoustic was somewhat dry. This tended to isolate the higher register instruments into individual sounds. The full tutti chords benefited from a strong bass foundation and often filled the space with lovely warm tones. The presentation of sustained chords without any rhythmic or structural component invited the listener to examine the sounds with no preconceptions or expectations. Harmonium #1 is an intriguing presentation of new harmonies that evoke new and often mysterious emotions.

In a Large, Open Space (1994), the second piece on the concert program, was completed almost 20 years after Harmonium #1 and is identical in structure. This is also scored “for any 12 or more sustaining instruments” and the disposition of the Southland Ensemble players in the large spaces of the Frankie Studio remained as before. In a Large, Open Space opens with a strong tutti chord dominated by a warm sound from the strings in the lower registers. The woodwinds soon join in, adding to the comforting overall feel of the sustained chord. The piece proceeds as before, each chord lasting about ten seconds with some small dynamic movements to engage the listener. The lower tones tended to fill the space most effectively and the higher voices – especially the flute – occasionally provided dissonance and tension. The contrast between the warmer, lower register chords and the higher dissonant tones is more pronounced in this piece. This aides the intent of the composer to evoke new emotions from the new chords created by the alternate tuning. The playing of the Southland Ensemble was both disciplined and precise in the intonation of the unconventional pitches.

The third piece on the concert program was Harmonium #7 (2000). Although separated from the other pieces by a number of years, the format is the same; a series of “sustained tones for 12 or more instruments.” Harmonium #7 began with strong tones from the cello and bass with flutes and violins joining in their register on what sounded like the same note. Other instruments entered on this tone and then slowly dissembled in pitch. This proved engaging to the ear and produced some nice harmonies. As the piece progressed, the chords seemed more congruently organized by this sharing of pitches. The low bass notes especially acted to fill the room with warm sounds as the bottom end of a great tutti chord. The harmonies in this piece seemed more connected when the bass predominated and dissonance limited to the flutes and violins in their higher registers. The experimentation over the years by Tenney with this form, had, by 2000, resulted in a more cohesive overall sound.

Alternate tuning has become almost mainstream in contemporary music today. This concert reminds us of the expressive possibilities and the new emotional power inherent in unorthodox tuning systems. This performance by Southland Ensemble of three works by James Tenney honors the innovation and influence of one of the great composers of West Coast experimental music.

Harmonium was made possible with support from #VaccinateAll58.

The Southland Ensemble is:

Jennifer Bewerse
Natalie Brejcha
Eric KM Clark
Joshua Gerowitz
Morgan Gerstmar
Heather Lockie
Michael Matsuno
Wiliam Roper
Cassia Streb
Christine Tavolacci
Marta Tiesenga
Dave Tranchina
Brian Walsh

by Paul Muller
Concert review, Contemporary Classical, Experimental Music, Los Angeles

Synchromy – Play Nice: An Evening of Two Harps

Elizabeth Huston and Catherine Litaker were the featured performers for Play Nice – An Evening of Two Harps, a concert presented by Synchromy and held on a rainy December 1, 2022. Originally scheduled for 2020, this concert was postponed for two years due to the Covid pandemic. Six pieces, including two world premieres, were on the program performed at the CadFab Creative gallery in the Culver City Arts District. A wide variety of unusual harp music was heard including solos, duos, extended techniques and pieces with integrated electronic processing.

The first half of the concert was titled Interstellar Space and opened with Suite Galactique, a solo work by Caroline Lizotte and performed by Catherine Litaker. This piece had two parts and the first, Exosphére, was a musical exploration of the extreme outer limits of earth’s atmosphere. This began slowly, with soft harp notes heard singly, then accelerating as more notes were added from the middle and lower registers. As the phrases moved up in pitch, the notes evoked the free and rising feeling of air escaping earth to the upper atmosphere. As the piece proceeded, more notes added a dimension of complexity that produced an introspective feeling. The playing was impressive and the shower of notes towards the finish produced a lovely sound that captured the giddy sense of the lightest of air molecules dancing in the outer reaches of the exosphere. The pitches continued moving upward and before trailing off in the very highest string register.

The second part of Suite Galactique was Hymne au Bon, and this had a more human and primal focus. As the programs notes explained: “The warrior sits down around a fire with his companions… The chattering effect in the very first bars suggest to us that the warrior is exhausted and cold after a hard struggle.” This was heard clearly as a buzzing sound created by a short piece of paper held in contact with one of the longer harp strings that was rapidly vibrating. The harp then produced a dramatic and familiar melody with a strongly Homeric sensibility. The feeling of relief that the warmth of a fire brings is present in the long runs of notes, aided by some singing by the harpist. Hymne au Bon has an ancient feel, a mixture of fatigue and wistful regret that artfully sketches the timeless image of a warrior resting after battle.

Starscape, by Jan Krzywicki, was next and intended as “…an evocation of night, the night sky and night thoughts.” This was performed by Elizabeth Huston and featured a continuous projection of changing star patterns on the back wall of the stage area. The music began with light trills accompanied by solitary notes and short runs. Drama was added as the piece progressed, with changes in dynamics, runs of notes that were variously faster or slower and some that were sharply struck. At times, the harp sounded a bit like a guitar, but with many more notes and pitches. Near the finish, a suggestion of tension crept in to the harmony but this did not detract from the overall feeling of space as mysterious and strange – but not menacing. A varied mix of playing techniques was required and this was accomplished with poise and confidence by Ms. Huston.

NCTRN V “beast of land and sea” followed, a world premiere composed by Nicholas Deyoe. The piece was commissioned by Synchromy with support from the American Harp Society. It is described in the program notes as a “solo for two harpists.” The opening tutti chord has a dark, uncertain feel and the subsequent harmonies were often dissonant but generally engaging. The two harps traded some interesting rhythms back and forth, and there was good visual communication between the players. As NCTRN V continued, a dark and murky feel developed, with the roiling texture suggesting a turbulent sea. The notes now had a more organic sound and towards the finish the harpists created a series of clicking sounds by running plastic rods along the tuning pins of each harp – all of this suggested whales signaling to each other in the dark depths of the sea. Harp music is seldom heard as a duo, and although this piece was at the margins of typical performance practice, and included extended techniques, it was played with great skill and coordination.

The second half of the concert focused on storytelling and opened with The Juniper Tree, by Rebecca Larkin. This was based on the Brothers Grimm story of the same name and was a disquieting reminder of how gruesome those old stories could be. The plot revolved around a young boy who is murdered by his step-mother, beheaded and cooked into a soup that his father was fed for dinner, unaware of its origin. The bones of the boy – all that is left of him – are buried by his younger sister under a juniper tree where his birth mother was interred. A bird, representing the boy’s spirit, soon appears in the tree singing beautiful songs. This bird flies about, collecting items from the townsfolk; a pair of dancing shoes for the sister, a gold chain for the father and a huge millstone that the bird uses to crush the wicked step-mother in revenge.

The story was vividly narrated by Leandro Cano while the harp duo supplied the accompanying music. The unfolding of this fairy tale was highly dramatic and the music kept pace with the swirl of emotions throughout. So well-matched was the music to the story line that the narration and the music became fused together in the listener’s brain. This was similar to watching a silent film accompanied by an orchestra – at some point the visual and the aural merge into a single perception. The harp playing was artfully executed and complimented the grim narration nicely. The Juniper Tree is an unforgettable story combined with artfully expressive music that leaves the listener simultaneously shaken and consoled.

Play Nice, by Eve Beglarian, followed and is well-named. The piece is intended to be performed by both Elizabeth Huston and Catherine Litaker on the same harp. Play Nice is disarmingly simple in its musical construction; the program notes describe it as “…totally diatonic, doesn’t even require two octaves on the harp, uses standard minimalist variation techniques, and in virtually every way plays nice, except for the performers. It’s actually a mean little thing.” The piece began with simple, single notes by Ms. Huston, seated conventionally at the harp. Ms. Litaker, standing to one side, joined in, adding her notes from the opposite side of the harp strings. With the repeating phrases and straightforward rhythms, a pleasing groove soon developed that was recognizably minimalist in both character and charm. The coordination between the players was impressive and visual communication had to be conducted while looking through the harp strings. Ms. Litaker commented later that she had to find her notes from what would be the opposite side of the harp from her normal hand position – a significant playing challenge, however straightforward the music. Play Nice is not only inventive and entertaining, but a chance to appreciate a duo performance in a unique configuration.

The final piece of the concert was the world premiere of {An End for a New Beginning} by Joshua Carro. This was aptly described in the program notes as “a work that symbolizes an interest to use instruments in new and unconventional ways.” Both harps were included as well as microphones, a large array of processing modules and the composer stationed off-stage at a laptop. A large three-dimensional image was projected on the back stage wall and this was programmed to change shape in response to the sounds from the two harps. The piece opened with the slapping of the lower harp strings so that deep, complex tones were sent into the microphones. The spherical image on the screen quickly morphed into a partially flattened doughnut that seemed to shimmer and squirm as the vibrations from the harps dissipated. Sticks were then drawn across the higher strings and this resulted in a series of sharp spikes around the perimeter of the image.

Various harp sounds were translated quickly into changes on the screen and the effects were mesmerizing to watch. All sorts of sounds came from the harps – buzzing, squealing, tones and thumping – everything, it seemed, except conventional melody. The extended effects were similar to those often heard on a piano, and in response the image rotated, swirled, expanded and contracted in a wide variety of shapes and contortions. The action was very smooth and the figure on the screen convincingly resembled a living organism. {An End for a New Beginning} boldly leaves behind traditional musical forms and content, replacing these with a new and intriguing amalgam of the sonic and the visual.

The Play Nice concert extended the creative horizons of the venerable harp, providing both inventive entertainment and intellectual enlightenment. The playing, while often far outside the scope of conventional harp performance practice, was superb and equal to the many technical challenges.

Play Nice was made possible by the Culver City Cultural Affairs Committee, the Culver City Arts Foundation and the American Harp Society.

by Paul Muller
CD Review, Contemporary Classical, Experimental Music, Los Angeles

Mattie Barbier – threads

The Covid pandemic of the last two years has drastically reduced live performances, and many musicians have stayed busy making studio recordings. Experimental music has benefited from this with the release of threads, a new CD from Sofa Music by trombonist Mattie Barbier. Recorded at the Tank Center for Sonic Arts in Rangely, Colorado in October of 2020, threads is an exploration of the possibilities of musical sounds when heard in an environment with ‘extraordinary internal acoustical resonance’. The Tank Center facility is built around an abandoned steel railroad water tank some seven stories high making it a unique venue for the recording of experimental music. Mattie Barbier, a talented Los Aangeles-based brass player, is focused on experimental intonation, noise, and the physical processes of sound creation. Threads – and the Tank Center – take his innovative efforts to a new level.


Since its opening in 2014, The Tank Center has been a mecca for sonic experimentation by leading new music artists such as William Winant, Todd Barton and Room Full of Teeth. The Tank acoustic boasts a 40-second reverberating sustain, and this opens up new horizons of expression in recorded performance. Mattie Barbier brings a background of virtuosic playing combined with an extensive presence in the Los Angeles new music community. His dynamic performances with wildUp, wasteLAnd music and Gnarwallaby are widely remembered. Barbier’s powerful trombone and euphonium – when combined with extremes of reverberation – what’s not to like? And how does the acoustic affect the performer? As the liner notes state: “threads is Mattie Barbier’s duo with the unique acoustics of The Tank, where, during the session, they learn how to relinquish the control and directness of playing solo.”

So how does a low brass instrument playing in a giant steel tank sound? The first track of the CD is untitled i and opens with rushing sounds and a deep rumbling bass tones that are sustained for several seconds at a time. The sounds seem to come from the lowest possible pitch register of the instrument and the tones fade in and out, often with a fluttery intonation. The sustained tones allow for unique sonic interactions within the highly reverberant acoustic. There is a powerful feel to this – like some great beast growling in its underground lair. In fact, this recording was selected as audio by the Museum of Jurassic Technology for an on-line event filmed in their Bestiary Exhibit – an appropriate realization.

Filter follows, and this is not dark or primal, but rather includes some higher pitched tones along with the fluttery lower sounds. As with the first track, the tones are long and sustained and there is now a clearly metallic color to the sound. The volume increases and fades but generally becomes more intense as the piece continues, as if we are staring into the bright rays of a sunrise. Some nice harmonies develop by overlap with tones in the middle and higher registers. All the sounds in filter are musical, but some are harsher than others, and this makes for good contrast. The high, smooth tones mix with lower ragged sound to form interesting textures. At 11:30, a low roar underneath adds drama and sense of mystery. The tones of filter seem to become thinner as it fades slowly to a finish.

Floating wave, track 3, features a low fluttering sound and varying dynamics. Similar tones are heard that make for occasionally interesting harmonies between the two. The rough musical tones that rise out of this cauldron of low sounds are very engaging, as if seeing beauty in the interior of a volcano. The pitches get higher and less fluttery as the piece proceeds – as if something is trying to form itself out of the chaos. An elementary version of alpine horns sounding across great mountain valleys is heard before the piece fades away at the finish.

Track 4 is untitled iii, and this has more rough flutter but evokes a mystical feeling. We are looking on an alien landscape, perhaps hearing the sounds of large beasts grazing peacefully. There is a sense of power in untitled iii; broad, but without malice. The final track, coda, opens with a sustained brass pitch in middle register, which then breaks into a much lower rumbling harmonic. Soon, clean tones enter, mixing in a nice harmony along with the flutter tone at the bottom. There is an earthy feel to this, perhaps hinting at human beginnings in a dark, wooded wilderness of long ago. The varied harmony and textures add to the inventive character of coda.

This new CD neatly documents the effects of the extreme acoustic environment on the instrument as well as demonstrating the ability of the performer to adapt to it. New possibilities are heard in the sound and an extra dimension of virtuosity is demonstrated by Mattie Barbier in the playing. Threads both illuminates and challenges our expectations at the edge of acoustic extremes.

Threads is directly available from Sofa Music as well as digital download from Bandcamp.

Personnel:
Mattie Barbier, trombone and euphonium
Weston Olencki, mixing and mastering

by Paul Muller