Modern eras, Umberto Eco suggested, have revisited the European Middle Ages ever since they ended. His own novel The Name of the Rose illustrates that point; so does the so-called early music revival. Katelyn Clark, heard here playing continuo and portative pipe organs, is a specialist in that flourishing field, and percussionist Isaiah Ceccarelli is a keen singer of late Medieval and early Renaissance compositions. Together they make music suffused with their shared enthusiasm while embracing contemporary interests and priorities. Landmarks reconstitutes the legacy of a past age within a current cultural paradigm where experimentation, readiness to improvise, and devotion to the intrinsic characteristics of sound prevail. These eight tracks, recorded in Montreal in December 2021, vary in duration from a little over one minute to more than twenty, yet all have a timeless air. This is due in part to the organ’s drone and hovering clusters of tones, and in part to the role assumed by Ceccarelli, which is not to punctuate or measure, but to expand and spatially enhance. To that end he uses bass drum, bell plates, and cowbells, and even introduces synthesized sound. Improvisation initiated the compositional process; then their complementary visions, steadily refined since this duo began working together in 2011, imparted a distinctive and compelling quality to their music, which carries real tension and drama within its cumulative mass and its air of timeless ritual.
Julian Cowley studied in London at University College, the Institute of United States Studies and King’s College, where his doctoral thesis on postmodern fiction was supervised by Eric Mottram. Cowley has lectured and published extensively on literature and cultural studies, and is now a freelance writer on music. He has contributed to every issue of The Wire magazine since 1998, and in recent years has published a number of articles and reviews in Musicworks and other adventurous publications. He lives in Hertfordshire, England, a short distance north of London.