Ancient rock carvings at Petroglyphs Provincial Park in eastern Ontario inspired Alexandra Mackenzie to call her latest solo musical project Petra Glynt. Evoking rock, ancient cultures, flashes of reflected light, and the enduring power of art, the name seems perfectly apt. Petra Glynt may be an experimental, mostly electronic music act, but just as petroglyphsContinue reading “Petra Glynt experiments in celebration”
Author Archives: Musicworks
Mark Molnar’s alternative trajectories
Harrowingly unbridled and unpredictable, yet blatantly meticulous in their construction, Mark Molnar’s compositions frequently emerge as rugged tangles of bowed-string sonorities. Even though their gestural expressivity might suggest that they could’ve been conceived in myriad other ways—through structured group improvisation, or perhaps through recording only—his pieces are written out with note-perfect exactitude. At first, oneContinue reading “Mark Molnar’s alternative trajectories”
The Restless Art of Radwan Ghazi Moumneh
It’s Friday night in Montreal, and a who’s who of local musicians is packed into the back room of Casa del Popolo to check out the first public appearance of Master of Masters My Master. Nobody knows anything about the music they are about to hear. All they have to go on is an eventContinue reading “The Restless Art of Radwan Ghazi Moumneh”
The Intimacy of Summer Listening
One Friday evening in early May, I jumped on my bicycle and dipsy-doodled to the Music Gallery along Toronto’s pothole-ravaged streets. Musician–producer Radwan Ghazi Moumneh was premiering a new work by Jerusalem In My Heart, the evolving performance project he founded in 2005. With a Canadian tour in the early summer, and European dates inContinue reading “The Intimacy of Summer Listening”
Quatuor Bozzini
Quatuor Bozzini is poetry, sweat, talent, idealism, determination, love, survival, fate, and a wonderful wild dance with the spirits. For fifteen years, the Montreal ensemble has steadfastly explored the notion of what contemporary music means today. The players are irrepressible creators and innovators, whether working in the far lands of experimental sound art, the closeContinue reading “Quatuor Bozzini”
John Preus’ Slow Sound
On a brisk fall afternoon in October, about two dozen people hunkered down in the intimate main room of Chicago’s Experimental Sound Studio. They watched some of the city’s more open-minded musicians—including guitarist Leroy Bach and drummer Mikel Avery—improvise on instruments that looked and sounded familiar, yet stood apart for their sculptural beauty. The instrumentsContinue reading “John Preus’ Slow Sound”
Nate Wooley’s Seven Storey Mountain
Jump into an early version of Nate Wooley’s Seven Storey Mountain, and you land in dark and turbulent, almost infernal terrain. Sounds are dense and blur into one another: trumpet amplified to distortion levels; prerecorded tape of unidentifiable noises; dense, rapid drumming of indecipherable rhythms. Later versions add more orderly elements: passages of stable pitchContinue reading “Nate Wooley’s Seven Storey Mountain”
Healing Power Records Hits Toronto With a Sonic Balm
The last place you’d expect to hear a comprehensive showcase of a modern experimental music community is on a dance mix. But with Heart of Toronto, a 2013 CD and download compilation, the Toronto-based label Healing Power has done just that. A compelling snapshot of North America’s fourth-largest city’s dizzyingly interconnected underground music scenes, HeartContinue reading “Healing Power Records Hits Toronto With a Sonic Balm”
The Blessed Riders of Streetcars in Vienna
Streetcars in Vienna are blessedly quiet. The machines—brand new, high-tech plastic platforms—announce themselves on approach with only a slight electric hum. I now react to their high pitch with the same short sprints I used to make to catch the lumbering College streetcar in Toronto. Riders of streetcars in Vienna are blessedly quiet. This isContinue reading “The Blessed Riders of Streetcars in Vienna”
Victor Gama builds a brave new soundworld
Wherever Victor Gama plays, you can be sure clusters of people will be jostling to percuss the upturned metal bowls of his tipaw (so called because the surface of the instrument looks like the pads of a tiger paw), to bow the eight metal strings of the tahra, or simply to wander the length ofContinue reading “Victor Gama builds a brave new soundworld”