Neil Young’s music is maybe one of the last things one would associate with Wandelweiser, the international collective of composers known for their copious silences, extended durations, and soft dynamics. However, on Albertan member Mark Hannesson’s guitar work If I appear comfortable, one hears echoes of Young’s forlorn solo guitar score for Jim Jarmusch’s 1995Continue reading “Works by Alberta composer Mark Hannesson featured on three Edition Wandelweiser Records albums”
Genre Archives
Joseph Shabason’s patient unravelling
When we listen to music, are we meant to enter the hearts and minds of those who’ve created it? Or is listening more of an interior experience—of turning inwards and creating space to experience our own feelings? For Joseph Shabason, the answer to both questions is yes. The Toronto-based saxophone player and new-jazz composer hasContinue reading “Joseph Shabason’s patient unravelling”
Benedict Schlepper-Connolly. The Weathered Stone.
At a time when rhythmic repetition in chamber music is so often co-morbid with cloyingly banal indie-isms, The Weathered Stone, from Irish composer Benedict Schlepper-Connolly, offers a rather bright glimmer of hope. From the outset, with its first and titular track (a piano trio), the sound is warm, but abstruse enough to engender curiosity. There’sContinue reading “Benedict Schlepper-Connolly. The Weathered Stone.”
R. Andrew Lee. Adrian Knight—Obsessions.
The last decade has seen an increase in long, single-movement repertoire for the piano, much of which has been the vehicle for inventive and introspective compositional voices. Adrian Knight’s quietly eccentric “Obsessions” is a potent addition to this microcanon. Within its first few moments, it clearly establishes the confines of an enigmatic but irrefutable listeningContinue reading “R. Andrew Lee. Adrian Knight—Obsessions.”
Tristan Perich. Parallels; Telescope; Active Field; Dual Synthesis.
Across his body of work, composer and conceptualist Tristan Perich varies from electronoise and glitched-out video to sound installations and drawing machines. But what he is no doubt most known for is a singularly focused and wonderfully varied approach to composition. His “one-bit music” got a fair bit of attention with the release of aContinue reading “Tristan Perich. Parallels; Telescope; Active Field; Dual Synthesis.”
The Idiosyncratic Musicality of Marc Sabat
The emergence of Arnold Schoenberg’s twelve-tone technique in the early 1920s not only presented an altogether new conception of pitch in music, it also prompted a dramatic and widespread shift in the fundamental thinking surrounding Western concert music. Its latent quasiscientific implications precipitated a number of new systems of composition. As composers foraged for newContinue reading “The Idiosyncratic Musicality of Marc Sabat”
Caduc
The word caduc translates from French as both obsolete and deciduous. Appropriately, the roster of Mathieu Ruhlmann’s humble Vancouver imprint, Caduc, plays right at the intersection of the organic world and senescent technology. Since late 2011, Caduc has built a catalogue of improvised and intuitively constructed music whose sonic fibre is audible, and often quite delicate.Continue reading “Caduc”
Insubordinations
The shifting technological terrain that has brought about the decline of the CD, the rise of the download, and the return of the LP, invites inventive solutions from musicians who want to get their music heard. In this spirit, the Swiss netlabel Insubordinations combines free downloads along with memorably designed, limited-edition CDs available on line,Continue reading “Insubordinations”
Charlemagne Palestine Pulls Out the Stops
Interpretation takes the sensory experience of the work of art for granted, and proceeds from there. What is important now is to recover our senses. We must learn to see more, to hear more, to feel more. —Susan Sontag, “Against Interpretation” “My work speaks for itself and doesn’t need to be explained,” Charlemagne Palestine insists,Continue reading “Charlemagne Palestine Pulls Out the Stops”