elsewhere interview On the Record
Recently, NYC music journalist Steve Smith did an in-depth intervew with me on my label elsewhere, in which I talked about my label's orientation and aesthetics as well as my future plans for the upcoming releases. Click here if you are interested in.
PRESS RELEASE: Biliana Voutchkova / Michael Thieke - Blurred Music (elsewhere 001-3)
The Berlin-based Bulgarian violinist Biliana Voutchkova and German clarinetist Michael Thieke have worked together intensely within both compositional and improvisational duo and group projects in Berlin since 2011. In their current project “Blurred Music”, the duo works with musical structures that create a blur; improvised parts alternate with fields of pre-structured material in which digital recordings of the duo are duplicated by live performance. Virtually identical fragments of the live performance synchronize simultaneously with the playback, unavoidably giving rise to blur in the temporal dimension, in the rhythmic, timbral, and motivic variations, and in the microtonal interpretation of individual pitches. The live portion of the duplicated material is still improvised, but within a framework purposefully restricted by the pre-recorded material, the intervals between which are indeterminate. To perception, what is being composed in real time blurs into what has been structured in advance; the difference can be registered only after an interval, if at all.
The triple CD 'Blurred Music' features three of the duo's live performances, recorded in Chicago, Philadelphia and New York during their USA tour in December 2016. These three live recordings are all differently structured, factoring in the conditions and the atmosphere of each venue as well as the musicians' own perspective and mindset. This series of three concerts, all occurring within a
Co-produced by David Sylvian and Yuko Zama, artwork by David Sylvian. The
(Release Date: July 14, 2018)
TRACK LIST
CD 1: Chicago (50:18) - recorded live on December 7,
CD 2: Philadelphia (40:09) - recorded live on December 14,
CD 3: New York (1:09:59) - recorded live on December 15,
CREDITS
Biliana Voutchkova - violin/voice
Michael Thieke - clarinet
all compositions by Biliana Voutchkova and Michael Thieke
recorded live by Michael Thieke
mixed and mastered by Taku Unami
artworks by David Sylvian
design by Yuko Zama
liner notes by Michael Thieke and Biliana Voutchkova
produced by David Sylvian and Yuko Zama
executive produced by Jon Abbey
p+c 2018 elsewhere
www.elsewheremusic.net
PRESS RELEASE: Melaine Dalibert - Musique pour le lever du jour (elsewhere 002)
Melaine Dalibert (born 1979), a French composer/pianist, has been increasingly recognized for his compositional piano works as well as his interpretations of works by Gérard Pesson, Giuliano D’Angiolini, Tom Johnson, Peter Garland
Fascinated by natural phenomena which are both expected and unpredictable, and also inspired by the work of the Hungarian-born French media artist Véra Molnar, Dalibert has developed his own algorithmic procedures of composition which contain the notion of stretched time evoking Morton Feldman, minimal and introspective, adopting a unique concept of fractal series. His piano music has been released on two recordings to date: Quatre pièces pour piano, self-released in 2015, and Ressac, issued by Another Timbre in 2017.
'Musique pour le lever du jour' (the title meaning 'Music for The Daybreak') was composed by Dalibert over two years and completed in 2017, with the concept being an ‘endless piece’ with no beginning or no end. This one-hour piece adopts slow tempi, leaving meditative space for long resonances in which pentatonic coloring gradually modulate in all tones, resulting in complex layers of direct tones, overtones, and prolonged reverberation, all organically subliming into rich sonorities with incredible harmonic clarity.
PRODUCER'S NOTE
I first came to know Melaine Dalibert’s compositions and piano performances when I listened to his recital at Daniel Goode's Loft in SoHo NYC in January 2018, when he played piano pieces by Peter Garland, Michael Vincent Waller and Dalibert, including his 2017 piece 'Musique pour le lever du jour' which is featured on this album.
When Dalibert opened the recital with Garland’s 1971 piece ‘The Days Run Away’, I was astonished by his distinct, vibrant piano tones which brought out the fullness of the music with an incredible depth of concentration and introspective serenity. Each individual note of the piano felt so vital and substantial, with profound dimensions created by the afterglow of each note, opening outward and inward simultaneously, rejuvenating Garland’s meditative masterpiece.
In his 'Musique pour le lever du jour', Dalibert used sustained pedals to create complex layers of resonances, which was mesmerizingly well composed - as if I were watching a mirage of a minimal abstract watercolor work gradually emerging in the room. Despite that there were numerous sounds occurring in resonances, blending together in the harmonies, there was no hint of cloudiness - the clarity was striking. I also loved the touch of human warmth I felt in his piano tones, which felt like it was faintly emanating out of the frame of clean minimalism. After I posted my review on the concert, Dalibert contacted me and told me that he was looking for a label to put out his 'Musique pour le lever du jour' - the very piece I loved during the concert and was hoping to hear again. It was coincidentally around the same time when I discovered Biliana Voutchkova and Michael Thieke’s ‘Blurred Music’ and was considering to start my own label, so I almost instantly agreed to include this piece, which has captivated my mind hauntingly, as the second release from my label.
Produced and design by Yuko Zama, artwork by David Sylvian. The single CD is a limited edition of 500. Besides CD format, digital HD FLAC 24/96 files are available on the label's website, as well as CDs and lossless files on Bandcamp.
Release Date: July 9, 2018
TRACK LIST
Musique pour le lever du jour (2017) 1:01:33
CREDITS
To Stéphane Ginsburgh
Melaine Dalibert - piano and composition
recorded by Melaine Dalibert in Rennes, France in March 2018
mixed and mastered by Taku Unami
artwork by David Sylvian
design by Yuko Zama
produced by Yuko Zama
executive produced by Jon Abbey
℗ © 2018 elsewhere
REVIEW
Best of Bandcamp Contemporary Classical: June 2018
https://daily.bandcamp.com/2018/07/06/best-of-bandcamp-contemporary-classical-june-2018/
French pianist and composer Melaine Dalibert has gained attention for his performances of works by melodically oriented minimalists like Peter Garland and Michael Vincent Waller, but in the last couple of years his own compositions have been reaching a wider audience through his dazzling 2017 album on the British imprint Another Timbre, Ressac. Musique pour le lever du jour is his eagerly anticipated followup to Ressac, and like the pieces on that previous album, the hour-long titular work deploys algorithms as a structural tool, building what Dalibert calls “space-time blocks” to suggest the stretching and compression of time. The music also draws upon the unpredictability of the natural world, such as the way a drop of water triggers surprising ripples when it strikes a larger liquid body. This gorgeous epic unfolds slowly, with ringing overtones fusing but never muddying the foreground of the single-note patterns Dalibert continually spreads out. He considers it an “endless piece,” with no obvious beginning or end. Instead, the focus is placed upon how each delicate phrase follows the next, with lots of repetition and subtle phrase modifications producing a Morton Feldman-like splendor: restrained, ineffable, and gorgeous. In fact, it’s almost advisable to treat the performance as an immersive experience, savoring the unhurried melodic patterns and allowing the rich harmonic effects to wash over oneself as a kind of meditative bath.
- Peter Margasak (June 6, 2018)
elsewhere On the Record
Very nice introductory article on elsewhere appeared On the Record, written by Steve Smith.
introducing 'elsewhere'
After being involved with music production first as a photographer, then as a designer and co-producer for Erstwhile Records for 15 years and Gravity Wave for 8 years, I decided to start my own label. The label's name is 'elsewhere', curated by me as a producer, and Jon Abbey as an executive producer.
My label will feature mainly contemporary work which has classical music aesthetics at its roots, but it may not have to strictly belong to the area of contemporary classical music. The essential goal for my label is to find and release good music which touches my heart deeply with its lasting value, created by earnest devotion from the artist’s pure soul, which I believe I will want to listen to repeatedly for a very long time - just like I love to return to Schubert or Mahler or Monteverdi, or any past classics that move me over the course of many years. This label may also feature some music outside classical aesthetics - as long as it feels real and genuine, or something that seems as if I were hearing it in the wind or from elsewhere, far away from the noise of the real world.
The first and the second releases from the label will be:
elsewhere 001-3:
Biliana Voutchkova / Michael Thieke Blurred Music (*triple CD set of three live recordings of the violin/clarinet duo’s compositions called ‘Blurred Music’)
elsewhere 002:
Melaine Dalibert - Musique pour le lever du jour (*Dalibert's recording of his own latest piano piece)
We are hoping to release this first pair in the second half of 2018. After putting out this pair, our plan is to release about two titles per year. Also, we are hoping to release hi-res audio files for download in the future, in addition to the regular CD format and lossless digital.
Deep thanks to all of you who have been devoted listeners of our Erstwhile Records and Gravity Wave for giving us tremendous support for many years until today. We sincerely hope that we will be able to keep going with this new label as well as Jon Abbey's Erstwhile and Michael Pisaro's Gravity Wave label for many years, and your continuous love and support will be deeply appreciated.
- Yuko Zama (2/12/2018)
Two years ago today ...
Two years ago today, a local newspaper in Matsumoto City, Nagano (my father’s hometown) featured a retrospective article on my late father, who was once a painter and art teacher and later became a designer. It was a very nice article, written by Nagaaki Ootake, art scholar and Director of Administration Office of Matsumoto-jo Castle.
My father has led a rather unfortunate life career-wise when he was young. The first misfortune happened when he won the first prize at the International Drawing Competition held in France when he was a college student, and awarded one million yen in the 1940's. But his intermediate agent, who was supposed to deliver the award to him, took all the money and disappeared. My father did not know what had happened for months, waiting for the contact from the agent until he realized the shocking fact later.
Another misfortune happened when my father’s former art student came to our house one day to desperately ask his creative advice. The student spent some time at our house, and eventually stole my father’s work-in-progress design from his desk and submitted it as his own graphic design to his boss at one of the largest ad agencies. The design became a big hit, the young designer became famous, but my father did not receive any credit. Similar things happened several times after that, like his long-time client (one of the most famous, long-established green tea companies in Japan) was stolen by the same major ad agency (they still use the same logo and package designs that my father originally designed, with no credit or copyright for him), but my father had never claimed his deserved credit or tried to make lawsuits. He was a reserved, quiet person and did not like causing any fuss in public, so he just held all the anger and disappointment inside, and kept silent. I never saw or heard him yelling or crying over those incidents. When something like that happened, he just sat at his work desk and kept silent in contemplation. When I was a kid, I could not understand why he did not try to take actions against those ill-willed people who took advantage of him. They knew that my father was not a kind of person who would make a fuss about it. I was furious about the injustice when I was a kid. But I kind of understand now - my father wanted to lead a peaceful life, holding onto his pride even if it was not publicly rewarded, swallowing all the sorrow and angers of being betrayed by his friends and acquaintances, and perhaps he still wanted to keep an inner peace and lived an innocent life, staying away from worldly impurity as far as possible. Also, on the other hand, not every design work of his was uncredited. Some of the store layout of a large shopping mall in the Kichijoji station, the graphic illustrations in a major publisher's elementary to high school textbooks (chemistry, mathematics, domestic science, etc.), they credited my father’s name as a designer. I learned how to cut vegetables or how to proceed a chemistry experiment by looking at my father’s precise illustrations, and hang out at some stores in the shopping mall which he designed. His artworks were not radical or cutting-edge, rather conservative and old-school, but the lines he had drawn were different from any other designers in school textbooks. While most designers used just one or two kinds of thick line to outline an object, my father used a variety of thickness of lines from a very thin line to a very thick line, which gave more realistic feel of dimensions and perspective to the object on paper. The extremely thin, delicate line was his signature, so it was always easy for me to distinguish his illustrations from others when I opened my new school textbooks.
Still now, when I visit Japan once in a while, sometime I come across some of my father’s design works in public places; in a wrapping paper of a major department store, in a logo and packages of the green tea company, in a logo of a newspaper .... My father’s name may not be credited to many of them, but when I see them, I feel proud and happy rather than feeling mad at those who stole the designs from him in the past. The fact that his designs have been widely appreciated and have survived over many generations means more than anything, and even though no one may know his name as the original designer of those logos and packages, his works remain here and now, and that is perhaps the greatest thing.
Since I remember my father as having such unfortunate luck in his design career, it was a great pleasure and a big surprise when I received a copy of this local newspaper article about him two years ago. It was a story about my father when he was still young, perhaps when he was holding onto an innocent belief for the future, and knowing that he had such optimistic days in his youth far before I was born was a sort of relief to me.
When I woke up this morning, somehow this article popped up in my mind, and when I looked at it again, I realized that the issued date was today from two years ago. I thought that is an interesting coincidence, so I translated the article to English and posted it here.
Invaluable oil paintings from a phantom local artist
(from an article by Nagaaki Ootake on Matsumoto Citizen Times, January 31, 2016)
When I look into the local history of art, sometimes I come across the artist's name Toshio Zama.
Toshio Zama's name appears in Hakutei Ishii's essay 'Sanga Ari' (Yet Mountains and Rivers Remain), in the chapter of Shinshu Local Artists Exhibition which was held at the Sanrin Sanpo Hall in Asama Hot Spring just before the end of World War II.
"(…) It is worth specially mentioning that a peculiar fellow named Zama, wearing a dark blue tight-sleeved short coat with white splash patterns and work pants, was lingering around the exhibition room for a very long time, standing up and sitting down in front of paintings. Zama kept mentioning Van Gogh's name, commenting that my paintings reminded him of Van Gogh's works, so I told him that I think my style is quite different from Van Gogh's. He also said a bizarre thing like that my painting of 'Matsumoto-jo Castle' had a similar flavor of Millet's 'The Angelus'. He pointed to a poplar tree in the painting and said, "Here is the primary object, which is a bit ghastly. In fact, this castle has a mysterious folklore …"
Toshio Zama was 25 years old at that time. Since Hakutei had adhered to moderate realism throughout his life, his style was quite different from that of expressionism painters like Van Gogh, but it is a pleasant episode that shows Toshio Zama's passion to pursue the new trend in his youth.
Although I have these small fragmented details on the painter, I could not gather enough data to get the full picture of him, and Toshio Zama had long been a phantom local artist to me.
In the autumn of 2013, our 30 year old house began to have problems and our lighting fixtures broke down, so we needed to replace them with new lighting fixtures, but did not know anyone in that business. When I was at a loss, my coworker told me that he had a friend who worked at an electronics shop, so I asked the electrician to come to our house. The electrician saw a huge amount of art-related books and materials stacked in our house, and told me that he knew a person whose uncle was a painter who had worked as a designer in Tokyo and also had taught Yayoi Kusama art a long time ago when she was very young. Surprisingly, that person was Toshio Zama. A clue to know about this artist, which I had been looking for a long time but could not get any hint, was suddenly presented to me with a mere coincidence. Through the electrician, I was able to get in touch with Toshio Zama's relatives who gave me a profile of the artist.
Zama's first name Toshio (敏生) was originally Toshio (敏夫) in Kanji character, but he used Toshio (敏生) as a painter/designer. He studied oil painting and sculpture at the Tokyo Fine Arts School (now the Tokyo University of Arts), and came back to his hometown to become an art teacher at the Matsusho Gakuen High School. Around the same time, perhaps after hearing that there was a new art teacher who graduated from an art college (which was rare in a countryside town then), Yayoi Kusama came to visit Zama to take private lessons to learn art. It was when Kusama was still in the Matsumoto Girls' High School (current Matsumoto Arigasaki High School), somewhere between 12 - 16 years old. Zama started to exhibit his paintings at the second All Shinshu Art Exhibition in 1946 until the third Nagano Exhibition in 1950, and quit his art teacher job in 1951 to move to Tokyo.
In Tokyo, he placed himself in the field of commercial design; he first worked at the Semba Corporation as a designer, and became a freelance designer around 1960. He co-authored a book 'Commercial Design - How To Conceive and Create Store Design' which became a must-read guidebook for commercial design beyond generations. The logo design of the sport newspaper Daily Sports was also a work by Toshio Zama.
It was difficult for me to find the oil paintings of Zama, but I found one small piece at Shizuka, an old Japanese-style pub (izakaya) run by the same family for generations. Shizuka has been a place where local artists and cultural figures hang out from old times, with the owners' family members who have also been art lovers, so that must be why this painting was kept by them until today. Since then, I received news from Zama's family who found another painting of his, which I posted here. These paintings seem to indicate his solid attitude as a painter who graduated from an art college.
(Nagaaki Ootake, Art Scholor and Director of Administration Office of Matsumoto-jo Castle)
続・ふるさと美の風景 ～物故作家のメッセージ22～
（松本市民タイムス 2016年1月31日掲載）
「幻の郷土作家 貴重な油絵」
郷土の美術史を調べていると、時折、座間敏生（ざまとしお）の名前を見かけることがある。
石井柏亭の随筆『山河あり』の、終戦間際に浅間温泉の三鱗産報会館で開催された「在信州有志油絵展覧会」の項に座間敏生が登場する。
「（前略）座間某（なにがし）と云う変り者が筒袖の紺絣（こんがすり）にもんぺ穿きで立ったり坐ったりして長く会場に頑張ったことを特筆するに足りる。座間はゴッホゴッホと云い、私の画をゴッホに似て居ると云うから、私は大分傾向が違うと告げた。彼はまた私の『松本城』にミレの『晩鐘』の趣があるなどと奇抜なことを云い、ポプラの樹を指して『ここが眼目だ、妖怪的なところがある、この城には一寸伝説もある…』などと云った。」
この時、座間敏生は25歳。柏亭は生涯を通して穏健な写実を貫いた人だから、ゴッホのような表現主義的な画法とはまったく異なるが、若かりし座間敏生の新しい傾向を追い求めようとする情熱が感じられて微笑ましい。
こうした断片的な資料はあっても作家の全貌を知るだけのものはなく、わたしにとって座間敏生はずっと幻の作家だった。
平成25年秋、筑後30年が経過した自宅の照明器具が駄目になり、交換したいが気軽に頼める業者がなく困っていたら、職場の同僚が縁者に電気屋さんがいると言うのでお願いしてきてもらった。その折、我が家に美術関係の書籍や資料が沢山置いてあったのを見て、電気屋さんは茶飲み話に、知人の叔父に若かりし頃の草間彌生に絵を教えたり、東京でデザイナーとして活躍した人がいるという話をしてくれた。何とその人物が座間敏生だったのである。長らく不明だった座間敏生を知る糸口が、偶然にもわたしの前に現れた。その電気屋さんを通じて、座間敏生の身内の方々に作家の行歴を教えていただいた。
座間敏生の本名は座間敏夫と書き、作家としては敏生と称した。東京美術学校（東京芸術大学の前身）の油画科と彫刻科に学び、帰郷して松商学園の美術教師となった。その頃、田舎では珍しい美校出身の教師がいると聞いて草間彌生は訪ねてきたのだろう。草間彌生がまだ松本高等女学校（現在の松本蟻ヶ崎高校）の学生だった頃のことである。座間は昭和21（1946）年の第２回全信州美術展から昭和25年の第３回長野県展まで出品し、昭和26年に教師を辞して上京した。
東京では一貫して商業デザインの世界に身を置き、株式会社「船場」に勤め、昭和35年頃に退職してフリーのデザイナーとなった。昭和41年に共著で出版した『コマーシャルデザイン 商店図案の考え方・作り方』は、後々まで商業デザインの手引書として利用された。スポーツ新聞デイリースポーツのロゴデザインも座間敏生のものである。
油絵がなかなか見つからず、老舗居酒屋「しづか」に小品が１点あるのを、やっと探し出した。「しづか」には昔から多くの文化人が集まり、芸術に理解があったからこの絵も残ったのだろう。その後、ご遺族から１点見つかったという知らせがあり、その絵も載せる。美校出身の画家らしい堅実な画風である。
（松本城管理事務所長、美術研究家・大竹永明＝松本市）
Melaine Dalibert performed Peter Garland, Michael Vincent Waller, Melaine Dalibert (NYC)
Last night, the French composer and pianist Melaine Dalibert performed works of Peter Garland, Michael Vincent Waller, and Melaine Dalibert at Daniel Goode's Loft, NYC.
The concert opened with Peter Garland’s 1971 piece ‘The Days Run Away’. Melaine Dalibert’s piano touch is distinct and vibrant, bringing out the fullness of the music with an incredible depth of introspective concentration and calmness. Each individual note of the piano felt vital and substantial, with profound dimensions created by the afterglow of each sound, rejuvenating Garland’s meditative masterpiece.
Next piece was Michael Vincent Waller's 2017 composition 'Bounding'. This piece has a warmth and melancholy which faintly echoes that of Schubert, while the atmospheric, shadowy tones evoked the silent landscapes of Béla Tarr's black and white films. While having the straightforward aesthetics of Romantic music in his roots, Waller seems to pursue his own landscapes of music via his unique narrative and evocative soundings. Dalibert played this piece plainly but compellingly with a keen, insightful interpretation.
The last piece of the first half was Melaine Dalibert performing Waller’s 2018 piece 'Cyclone' written for alto saxophone and piano, featuring special guest Elie Dalibert. This composition was subtly layered with the piano part and the saxophone part overlapping organically. The result was a fantastic unity of the two different instruments, performed in perfect chemistry by the Dalibert brothers.
The last half opened with Melaine Dalibert performing four more of Waller's compositions written in 2017-18; the first three of which were dedicated to the late Pauline Oliveros, Waller's late father and his late grandfather (both of them passed away in 2017), each conveying blissful moments of lights and happiness in memory of the loved ones, rather than shadows and sorrow. The innocent peacefulness of these pieces was touching, much more compelling than an intense expression of sadness of loss.
The next piece - Waller's 2018 composition 'Return from L.A.', consisting of four movements - was vibrant. The first movement began with high-pitched tones sparkling like Ravel's piano pieces. The dynamics were clear and sharp, organically changing rhythms and tempos, brightness and shadows, throughout the four movements.
The last pieces were Dalibert's 2017 compositions 'Musique pour le lever du jour' and 'Etude II'. In these pieces, Dalibert delivered complex layers of direct tones, overtones and prolonged reverberation using sustained pedals, to create incredibly rich sonorities. Despite that there were numerous sounds blending together, there was no hint of cloudiness - the clarity was striking. I bought his 2017 album ‘Ressac’ (another timbre) after the concert, which contains another breathtaking piece ‘Ressac’ composed by Dalibert in 2015 (highly recommended).
The acoustics of this room were fantastic, too. With some fabrics effectively placed in the corners of the space, the sound of the piano was not too bright or too muffled, a really nice, cozy and open atmosphere.
The Budapest Festival Orchestra performed Bach, Beethoven, Rachmaninoff under Iván Fischer w/ Dénes Várjon
Last night, I saw the Budapest Festival Orchestra under Iván Fischer performing Bach: Orchestral Suite No. 2 in B minor, Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 3 in C minor, and Rachmaninoff: Symphony No. 2 in E minor. It was magnificent.
I love the cloudless sounds, clear-cut precision and perfectly timed rhythms of Iván Fischer's conducting. (I am a big fan of his Mahler recordings.) Last night at the Lincoln Center, the Budapest Festival Orchestra responded to Fischer with a superb sensitivity and a stunningly wide dynamic range of expressions, from the extremely soft, quiet pianissimo to the dynamic outburst of tutti (both of which I think are crucial to play Rachmaninoff). The orchestra's sounds are straightforward and clean with no excessive colors, evoking the clear water of an unspoiled lake deep in the forest. The clarity of the sounds and the rich, deep reverb of the strings reminded me of the masterful skills of the Cleveland Orchestra, and each section of instruments closely communicated with each other with the intimacy of a chamber ensemble, which reminded me of the perfect chemistry among musicians of the Munich Philharmonic. (These are two of my favorite orchestras in the world.)
The first piece, Bach: Orchestral Suite No. 2 in B minor, began with a rather quiet, reserved manner, performed by an ensemble of seven musicians under Fischer. I liked the understated expressions of the ensemble - it felt like a clean wind quietly blowing through the hall, with no heaviness attached. The lightness of the ensemble’s sounds gradually developed into a more vivid, brisk, clearer sounds toward the end. The gradual transition of the sound texture was refreshing, creating a narrative flow of the music in a very subtle manner.
The next piece was Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 3 in C minor, performed by Hungarian pianist Dénes Várjon. I have not heard his name before this concert, but his piano on this Beethoven piece was exquisite. While maintaining crystal-clear tones and confident touch throughout the piece, Várjon showed a wide range of expression with keen attention to the sounds, especially to the pianissimo in the slow movement. The chemistry between Várjon and the orchestra was so natural and perfect that the sounds of the piano blended into the orchestra flawlessly in every moment when they merged.
The last piece was Rachmaninoff: Symphony No. 2 in E minor performed by the full orchestra. It is rare to see Rachmaninoff pieces listed in concert programs these days, and in fact, it was the first time I listened to Rachmaninoff in a live concert. I am so glad that it was performed by this orchestra, since they have a perfect balance between rustic earthiness and clear, refined sounds, both of which are (to me) very important for Rachmaninoff's pieces, blending two contradictory natures.
But the most remarkable thing about the Budapest Festival Orchestra was the organic flow of music which Fischer created carefully and unpretentiously, to make the music move as naturally as the wind. The tempo of each piece was rather slow, not accentuating highlights so dramatically (and some audience members might have felt it was too plain), but I found the naturalness of this flow beautifully tasteful.
For an encore, they played Rachmaninoff's Vocalise No.14, Op.34, with half of the string musicians standing and singing vocalise while the rest were playing their instruments. Their voices were not as refined as real singers, but the simple, earthy voices filled the hall with a rustic tranquility. I have almost never seen a big-name orchestra like them revealing such fragile moments on stage, but it was refreshing, as if we were hearing their inner voices telling us how much they genuinely love music, just like we do.
My Top 10 Albums / Concerts of 2017
CLASSICAL
1. Munich Philharmonic Orchestra under Sergiu Celibidache - Schubert: Symphony No. 8, "Unfinished" / Dvořák: Symphony No. 9, "From the New World" (MPHIL0004)
2. Boston Symphony Orchestra under Andris Nelsons - Brahms: The Symphonies (BSO Classics)
3. Christian Gerhaher, Gerold Huber - Schubert: Die Schöne Müllerin (Sony Classical)
4. Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra under Mariss Jansons - Mahler: Symphony No. 9 (BR-Klassik)
5. Skip Sempé and Capriccio Stravagante - William Byrd: Virginal & Consorts (INTERARTS)
6. London Symphony Orchestra & Monteverdi Choir under John Eliot Gardiner - Mendelssohn: A Midsummer Night's Dream (LSO Live)
7. Andreas Staier & Alexander Melnikov - Schubert: Fantasie in F Minor and Other Piano Duets (harmonia mundi)
8. Amarcord - Tenebrae (Tallis, Dietrich, Stoltzer, Stahel, Machaut, Boquiren, Ockeghem, Moody, Walter, Byrd, Kedrov, Gesualdo, Walter, Tavener, des Prez, Ludwig, etc.) (edition apollon)
9. MusicAeterna under Teodor Currentzis - Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 6 (Sony Music Canada Inc.)
10. Krystian Zimerman - Schubert: Piano Sonatas D959 & 960 (Deutsche Grammophon)
ANTHOLOGY
Walter Gieseking - The 1950s Solo Studio Recordings (APR 7402)
Jacqueline du Pré - The Heart of the Cello (Warner Classics)
CONTEMPORARY/EXPERIMENTAL
1. Jürg Frey - Collection Gustave Roud (at115x2) review
2. Jürg Frey - ephemeral constructions (EWR 1709) review
3. Jürg Frey - l’âme est sans retenue l (ErstClass 002-5) review
4. Antoine Beuger - Ockeghem Octets (at114)
5. Michael Pisaro - Sometimes (EWR 1703)
6. Irene Kurka - chants (EWR 1710)
7. Ryoko Akama - places and pages (at110x2)
8. Keith Rowe / Michael Pisaro - 13 Thirteen (Erstwhile 085-2)
9. Taku Sugimoto - Quintets: Berlin, San Diego (Meena-984)
LIVE PERFORMANCE
1. English Baroque Soloists & Monteverdi Choir under John Eliot Gardiner performing Monteverdi - Orfeo / The Return of Ulysses / The Coronation of Poppea (Lincoln Center, NYC 10/18, 19, 21)
"L'Orfeo" de Monteverdi par John Eliot Gardiner - live @ La Fenice
Kangmin Justin Kim and Hana Blažíková perform the final act duet, Pur ti Miro from Monteverdi's L'incoronazione di Poppea.
2. Boston Symphony Orchestra under Andris Nelsons, performing Sofia Gubaidulina - New Work for Violin, Cello, Bayan, and Orchestra (NY Premiere, co-commissioned by Carnegie Hall) / Shostakovich - Symphony No. 7, "Leningrad" (Carnegie Hall, NYC 2/28)
Boston Symphony Orchestra under Andris Nelsons, performing Ravel - Le tombeau de Couperin / George Benjamin - Dream of the Song (NY Premiere) / Berlioz - Symphonie fantastique (Carnegie Hall, NYC 3/2)
3. Munich Philharmonic under Valery Gergiev, Pierre-Laurent Aimard (piano), performing Ravel - La valse / Ravel - Piano Concerto in G Major / Beethoven - Symphony No. 3, "Eroica" (Carnegie Hall, NYC 4/3)
Munich Philharmonic Orchestra under Valery Gergiev, Genia Kühmeier (soprano), performing Debussy - Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune / Schubert - Symphony No. 4, "Tragic" / Mahler - Symphony No. 4 (Carnegie Hall, NYC 4/5)
4. Quatour Bozzini with Isaiah Ceccarelli (percussion) and Noam Bierstone (percussion), performing Jürg Frey - Unhörbare Zeit / String Quartet 3 (The DiMenna Center for Classical Music, NYC 8/4)
5. The Philadelphia Orchestra under Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Radu Lupu (piano), Sasha Cooke (mezzo-soprano), performing Bernstein - Symphony No. 1, "Jeremiah" / Mozart - Piano Concerto No. 24 in C Minor, K. 491 / Schumann - Symphony No. 2 (Carnegie Hall, NYC 5/9)
6. The New York Philharmonic under Paavo Järvi, Leif Ove Andsnes (piano), performing Esa-Pekka Salonen - Gambit (New York Premiere) / Rachmaninoff - Piano Concerto No. 4 / Sibelius - Symphony No. 5 (Lincoln Center, NYC 10/12) > review
7. Mitsuko Uchida, performing Mozart - Piano Sonata in C Major, K. 545 / Schumann - Kreisleriana / Jörg Widmann - Fantasy on Schumann (NY Premiere, co-commissioned by Carnegie Hall) / Schumann - Fantasy in C Major (Carnegie Hall, NYC 5/30)
8. Maurizio Pollini, performing All Chopin Program - Two Nocturnes, Op. 27 / Ballade No. 3 in A-flat Major, Op. 47 / Ballade No. 4 in F Minor, Op. 52 / Berceuse in D-flat Major, Op. 57 / Scherzo No. 1 / Two Nocturnes, Op. 55 / Piano Sonata No. 3 in B Minor, Op. 58 / Encore: Ballade No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 23 / Encore: Ballade No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 23 (Carnegie Hall, NYC 5/21)
9. The New York Philharmonic under Jaap van Zweden, Katia and Marielle Labèque (pianos), performing Philip Glass - Concerto for Two Pianos and Orchestra (New York Premiere) / Mahler - Symphony No. 5 (Lincoln Center, NYC 9/22) > review
10. Staatskapelle Berlin under Daniel Barenboim, performing Bruckner - Symphony No. 8 (Carnegie Hall, NYC 1/28)
10 MORE CONCERTS …
San Francisco Symphony under Michael Tilson Thomas, performing All Mahler Program: Adagio from Symphony No. 10 / Symphony No. 1 (Carnegie Hall, NYC 4/4)
Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra under Franz Welser-Möst, performing Schoenberg - Verklärte Nacht / Schubert - Symphony No. 9, "Great" (Carnegie Hall, NYC 2/26)
Piotr Anderszewski, performing Mozart - Fantasia in C Minor, K. 475 / Mozart - Piano Sonata No. 14 in C Minor, K. 457 / Chopin - Three Mazurkas, Op. 59 / J. S. Bach - English Suite No 6 in D minor BWV 811 (Carnegie Hall, NYC 2/17)
Sir András Schiff, performing All Schubert Program: Piano Sonata in A Minor, D. 845 / Four Impromptus, D. 935 / Klavierstücke / Piano Sonata in G Major, D. 894, "Fantasy" (Carnegie Hall, NYC 3/9)
Jean-Guihen Queyras, Alexander Melnikov, performing Schumann - Adagio and Allegro, Op. 70 / Yves Chauris - D'arbres, de ténèbres, de terre (World Premiere, commissioned by Carnegie Hall) / Beethoven - Cello Sonata in A Major, Op. 69 / Webern - Three Little Pieces for Cello and Piano, Op. 11 / Chopin - Cello Sonata in G Minor, Op. 65 / Encore: Debussy - Prologue: Lent, sostenuto e molto resoluto, from Cello Sonata in D Minor (Carnegie Hall, NYC 1/25)
Borodin Quartet, performing Schubert - Quartet in C minor, D. 703, “Quartettsatz” / Tchaikovsky - Album for the Young, Op. 39 (arr. R. Dubinsky) / Shostakovich - Quartet No. 6 in G major, Op. 101 / Shostakovich - Quartet No. 13 in B-flat minor, Op. 138 (92Y, NYC 10/24)
FOR/WITH: Works by Christian Wolff, Annea Lockwood, Michael Pisaro, Ashley Fure, performed by Nate Wooley, Ross Karre, Jessica Pavone, Megan Schubert, Kristin Norderval, Christian Wolff, Annea Lockwood, Michael Pisaro, Ashley Fure (Issue Project Room, NYC 9/29-30) > review
Michael Pisaro, performing "transparent city (2)" for electric guitar and pre-recorded accompaniment (The Old Stone House, NYC 4/13)
Seong-Jin Cho, performing Berg - Piano Sonata, Op. 1 / Schubert - Piano Sonata in C Minor, D. 958 / Chopin - 24 Preludes, Op. 28 / Encores: Debussy - "Clair de lune" from Suite bergamasque / Chopin - Ballade No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 23 / Bach - Sarabande from French Suite No. 5 in G Major, BWV 816 (Carnegie Hall, NYC 2/22)
Leif Ove Andsnes, Marc-André Hamelin, performing Mozart - Larghetto and Allegro for Two Pianos (completed by Paul Badura-Skoda) / Stravinsky - Concerto for Two Pianos / Debussy - En blanc et noir / Stravinsky - Le sacre du printemps for Two Pianos / Encores: Stravinsky - "Madrid" for Two Pianos from Four Studies for Orchestra (transc. Babin) / Stravinsky - "Circus Polka" for Two Pianos (transc. Babin) / Stravinsky - Tango for Two Pianos (transc. Babin) (Carnegie Hall, NYC 4/28)
SONG (TRACK) OF THE YEAR
Jürg Frey - Farblose Wolken, Glück, Wind from Collection Gustave Roud (at115x2)
(w/ Regula Konrad on soprano, Stefan Thut on cello, Stephen Altoft on trumpet, Lee Ferguson on percussion, Texts by Gustave Roud, Jürg Frey ) > review
Jürg Frey - Ephemeral Constructions (EWR 1709)
I have been listening to Jürg Frey’s music intensively in the last few months. I first became aware of Frey’s works in 2010, around the time when I discovered Wandelweiser composers’ works and became deeply immersed in - first Michael Pisaro’s prolific series of pieces, then more works from Antoine Beuger, Manfred Werder, Radu Malfatti and Jürg Frey.
In the last three years, my taste for music has shifted toward older classical music, often attending concerts performed at Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center, as well as listening to numerous older classical music recordings - mostly of Romantic composers. What triggered me to dig into this older classical music was Mitsuko Uchida’s Mozart Piano Sonata CD (1984), which I found in my late father-in-law’s substantial collection of classical music CDs. Deeply touched by Uchida’s delicate, sorrowful, contemplative piano tones in Mozart Sonatas and Rondo in A minor, I further dug into her Schubert, Schumann, Beethoven and Mozart Piano Concertos with the Cleveland Orchestra, then into other orchestras, composers, pianists, and an infinite number of classical music recordings up to the present. I used to eagerly listen to Baroque music in my teens, then early music and Renaissance music (and some Mozart) in my 20’s, but listening to Romantic composers’ works so intensively was a completely new and exhilarating experience.
During this time, I did not listen to current experimental music pieces as much as I used to do, since I found a difficulty in loving these two very different genres and eras of music at the same time. However, Wandelweiser music was in a unique position. It was when I came to listen to Webern after going through the Romantic period, when I sensed a similar texture in Webern’s silence which instantly reminded me of that of Malfatti’s silence and Frey’s silence. Perhaps Webern’s silence was rather closer to Malfatti’s than Frey’s (although the hint of Romanticism was closer to Frey’s), and the moment of the two ‘silences’ overlapping in my mind brought me straight back to Wandelweiser music again. There were of course other composers who explored significant meanings of silence during the two eras, but Webern’s silence - which still had a lingering air of Romanticism - was a revelation to me to connect two separate pieces of the puzzle together - Romantic music and Wandelweiser. It broke down the wall between these two worlds, both of which I have been deeply fascinated during the last eight years. Also, after obsessively listening to old classical music for three years, the music of Wandelweiser composers started to reveal more layers and a depth that I did not notice before. Sometimes I find similar aesthetics and structures in Wandelweiser composers’ works - especially in Frey’s - as those of Renaissance or Romantic composers’ works, although there are of course distinct differences in the concepts and styles. Further listening to Frey’s recent works has deepened the connection between these two separate eras of music. I love the way both Frey’s music and some Renaissance or Romantic composers’ works sound coherent with no conflict to my ears transcending genres and eras, even though the atmosphere and textures of both are quite different.
Occasionally in my life, I have been intensely drawn to some specific music, ending up immersed in the music for quite a long time. It does not happen so often, but when it happens, the irresistible beauty of the music occupies my mind like a storm to the extent that it brings me a heartache or a torment - with words and images welling up in my mind, haunting me all the time with the sounds of the music. The only way to be free from this torment is to write down all those words and images in my text, trying to give verbal shapes to the spell of the music which enthralled me. It happens only once in a while, only when the power of the music is tremendous, and it was very hard when I was very young since I did not know how to get out of the spell of the music then. For instance when I was 13, I fell into a whirl of Pachelbel's Canon in D, and could not get back to the reality (my normal school life) for several months. My brother had a mix tape of Baroque music, and I became to be drawn to the fragments of the music occasionally heard from his room. But he did not let me listen to his music collection when he was home, so I sneaked in his room when he was at school, listening to the mix tape with his headphones while I was alone. There were music of J.S. Bach, Vivaldi, Handel, Telemann and Pachelbel on the cassette tape, but the music which captivated me most was Pachelbel's Canon in D. It was mesmerizing in spite of its simple structure and short length - three violins and a baseline of basso continuo, simply repeating eight bars of music for 28 times, slowly and gradually growing into more complex developments of the theme over the course of seven minutes or so (the version I was listening to then was Jean-François Paillard’s). I was fascinated by the way a simple phrase slowly and organically develops toward the ending, evoking different landscapes of different colors in my mind. Now when I listen to this piece again, I am surprised with the fact that this is only five or seven minutes piece, since when I was 13, it felt like much longer - like 30 minutes or so. There was a hypnotic power in the cycles of this music, and I was completely addicted to it. I tried to follow every subtle change in every repetition of the harmonies, to figure out why this music is so touching. I started to skip school just because I wanted to listen to this Canon with my brother’s headphones while he was not at home. It was the first time when I was captivated by the spell of the music so overwhelmingly, to the extent that I could not relate to reality so well - like sinking deep down into the sea without knowing how to float back to the surface. (Eventually, I started to play and sing music myself in a youth choir and a recorder ensemble, and these involvement with musical activities certainly helped me to get connected to the healthy reality again. I do not play music now, but I found that writing helps me in a similar way.)
Canon is such a powerful form of music, and although it looks so simple and plain in the structure, the accumulated (silent) power with momentum gained from circling and repetition has almost a magnetic (physical) effect on me. Also, the repetitivity of a canonic form seems to resonate with our familiar cycle of living everyday life, while the seemingly indefinite loop of the music echoes with our desperate wish for the eternal. I find a similar compelling, magnetic power of repetition in Schubert’s sonatas, too. I was just thinking about these things when I was listening to Frey’s Circular Music #7 on 'Ephemeral Constructions' (EWR 1709) the other day, which captivated me with its haunting beauty - like Pachelbel's Canon in D did to me before - but in a more peaceful way.
Frey has been releasing his Circular Music series since 2013 - some of them are titled ‘Extended Circular Music’ - in his four recent albums including this one. He also recorded a composition titled ‘Canones Incerti’ in 2013 and 2014, which is more abstract and less simpler than the later Circular Music pieces, seemingly the early canonic piece in his catalog. Each of his Circular Music pieces have a different structure, texture and duration, and some of them are unforgettably beautiful - like Extended Circular Music No. 2 and 3 performed by Tamriko Kordzaia (piano) and Petra Ackermann (viola) on Frey’s 2014 CD ‘Untitled’ (Musiques Suisses).
Frey talked about his other canonic piece Circular Music #2 and how his interest in composing canons or circular music has grown in his later works in his interview on the ddmmyy site, which is quite interesting to read.
“I started to write the first canons in the late 90s. It was more a coming from outside. A curator in Sweden was asking me for pieces who was interested in counterpoint and canon. I thought ‘I should write something for him which is connected with canon’.”
“Well in this piece (Circular Music No.2), I think it was first the idea of being circular. There is a long story behind this because earlier in my career if someone would have told me that circular things could happen in my music in this way, I would have thought it impossible! I always had the impression that I had to place every chord. I have to take it with my hand… It’s not a circular mechanism. So this was very far away from every idea of mine. My idea is that I have to touch every note, every sound, I have to pick it up and put it in the right place for the right duration. It took a long time before I started to write canons or circular pieces. It was a discovery!”
“My first canons were most of them ‘pauses in canons: little single notes and the rest was silences so that you don’t hear any kind of ‘canon’, because there are such long breaks in between the notes. This was the first step. Then slowly I developed more canonic and circular techniques and at the end of this process I learnt that when you take the right notes and the right silences it’s so lovely because it creates something that I was looking for all the time: it goes by itself! The music goes by itself! I don’t touch every note but I let them go. The idea from Feldman of letting notes go. They go by themselves. It took such a long time before I learnt.” (Jürg Frey)
Ephemeral Constructions
'Ephemeral Constructions’ contains Frey’s three recent pieces from 2015 to 2016, performed in the spring of 2016 by the University of South Carolina Experimental Music Workshop under the direction of Greg Stuart, and three musicians - Erik Carlson on violin, Jürg Frey on clarinet, and Stuart on vibraphone and percussion. The first 40 minute piece Ephemeral Constructions (2015-16) and the third 24 minute pieces Circular Music #6 (2015) were performed by the three musicians and the Workshop ensemble together. The middle piece Circular Music #7 (2015), a little less than five minutes, was performed by the three musicians - Stuart, Carlson and Frey.
The first track, Ephemeral Constructions, begins with quiet, dispersed sounds of objects performed by the Workshop ensemble. The sounds of objects - something like lightly hitting wooden blocks and glass material - sparsely appear sporadically in a silent room, evoking flickering lights or raindrops falling onto a floor. These sounds of objects come from all directions, near and far, left and right, creating a spacious feel and a clear sense of perspective with great acoustics. At first, these sounds of the ensemble feel like random abstract sounds, but soon I noticed that there is a hint of cyclic rhythms in the way these sounds appear - though very vaguely. Around 6’24”, two single tones of a vibraphone appear softly at a regular interval, evoking faint warm lights emerging in the middle of the empty spatial room. A husky tone of a clarinet appears as well, followed by a violin with a similar quiet tone, both playing thin, prolonged passages. The two layers of the sounds happening in the space - one is the vertical, cool, realistic sounds of the ensemble’s hard objects, and the other is the horizontal, soft sounds of the three instruments - create a stereoscopic soundscape with a unique contrast of the textures, emphasizing the warm, organic feel of the three instruments. The ensemble’s sparse object sounds gradually increase their volume almost imperceptibly, clarifying the air of the room with the cool echos. Around 18’56”, the three instruments (vibraphone, clarinet and violin) play short phrases in minor scale in unison, bringing a hint of tonal music in the vague, abstract soundscape. In the last half of the track, fragments of faint melodies and chords of the three instruments appear and linger like a trail of a cloud, sharing the same meditative stillness as silence - which evokes of the listener’s contemplative mind. Near the end of the track, some short phrases of melodies and harmonies begin to take more obvious forms, though being still half abstract. It is like watching fine particles of a music emerging in the air gradually drawn to each other, almost forming a tonal music.
The second track, Circular Music #7, begins with a unison performed by the three musicians (violin, clarinet, vibraphone/percussion), slowly repeating a canonic cycle in eight bars for six times in a very quiet, prolonged manner. The previously heard sparse fragments of melodies seem to become one to create a seamless flow of music in this piece. The melancholic, blank tones of the violin and clarinet create a gray atmosphere in minor key, while the warm tones of the vibraphone in the last bar sound consoling. The lethargic melody of this five minute canon is unforgettably poignant, though very simple and short.
The third track, Circular Music #6, is performed by the Workshop ensemble in a similarly sparse, abstract soundscape as the first track, again evoking a large empty room. The sounds of three instruments (clarinet, violin, vibraphone/percussion) emerge softly and vaguely in the stereoscopic raindrops of various object sounds, trailing like a translucent cloud in the meditative silence. The dreamy tones of the three instruments evoke in me a shadow or a mirage of the previously heard short canon (Circular Music #7), floating in the room like a hologram image. The sounds of the three instruments move in a cyclic pattern, slowly increasing their presence as they repeat for several times, then diminishing into silence almost imperceptibly in a prolonged way.
I like to listen to these three pieces as one long composition - the first piece as a prelude in which a special 'room' is set up for small fragments of a canon to emerge, the second piece as the heart of this album: a short-life canon (Circular Music #7), and the last piece as a room where a shadow of the canon lingers like a hologram. The open feel of the space created by the great acoustics can be likened to the listener’s mind (or subconscious), too, where Frey’s canon is organically formed and heard, leaving the residual image in. The simple, quiet presence of Circular Music #7 contains the hypnotic power of a canon, but does not shake my emotions overwhelmingly like Pachelbel's Canon in D did to me long ago.
When I was captivated by Pachelbel's Canon in D when I was a kid, the beauty of the music filled my mind with tremendous joy, but also brought me a pain with a sense of loss afterwards, making it hard for me to reconnect to the reality again. I had a similar experience recently, when I saw John Eliot Gardiner conducting Monteverdi’s trilogy of operas: L'Orfeo, The Return of Ulysses and The Coronation of Poppea in NYC in three nights in October. It was one of the most divine, marvelous, powerful, soul touching live music experiences I have ever had. Gardiner’s straightforward, simple approach highlighted the pureness of Monteverdi’s music, delivering the essence of human emotions with restrained elegance and humbleness. I was deeply moved by the perfectly nuanced, poignant, rich musical expressions, which brought out the epiphanic beauty of the early 17th century librettos vividly. The period instruments of the English Baroque Soloists delivered the subtlety of each phrase with rich, warm, translucent overtones that filled the hall with the celestial beauty. The dynamic range of the sounds from pianissimo to fortissimo was delicately nuanced with precisely timed rhythms and perfectly pitched harmonies. The ceaseless flow of Monteverdi’s music wrapped me in intense emotions over the three days, blowing my mind like Pachelbel’s Canon did to me when I was a kid. But when the three nights of sublime music were done, I felt somewhat lost and depressed - like facing a dead end - seized by deep sorrow with a sense that I may not be able to experience such celestial beauty again for the rest of my life. Some tremendous beauty was experienced, shaking the deepest part of my soul, but when it was gone, the door was closed. The open space, which I used to cherish in mind, felt somewhat to be lost. It was like the ‘perfectness’ of the live performances of Monteverdi’s operas dominated my mind with its stormy power and irresistible beauty, putting my mind to a halt as it receded.
Music from Renaissance and Baroque periods often has this overwhelming power over me, mesmerizing me while the music is on, then closing the door when it is over. Unlike that, Frey’s canon - or circular music - does not draw me into a closed place, though moving me deeply with a similar essential beauty to that of Renaissance or Baroque music, yet in a much calmer way. To me, Frey’s canon ‘Circular Music #7’ is more magnetic and haunting than Pachelbel's Canon in D, because it has an elemental power and because it has an openness for the listener. Both canons are similarly short - about five minutes - but the atmosphere and the effect on the listener of each piece is quite different. Not like pulling the listener into the closed world of music by the force of composition, Frey’s canon lets the listener be synchronized with the music naturally, and lets him/her stay in the music without giving a sense of loss afterwards. I can feel the quiet presence of his Circular Music #7 in my mind even after the music ends, knowing that the door is still open, my mind half overlapping with the reality where I live in.
I often feel that Frey’s music has two layers - one is Frey’s composition performed by the musicians, the other is an open space (often found in silence or in a quiet, sparse soundscape) where the listener’s mind can assimilate into without losing touch with reality. The beauty of this album ‘Ephemeral Constructions’ lies here, in this double layer of ‘construction’ of sounds and silence - one layer is actually heard from the CD, the other layer is formed in my memory. This uncertainty - or a half-formed ambiguity - imprints a long-lasting image in my mind, perhaps since it involves my own imagination to be a part of constructing this music.
Each of Frey’s Circular Music works has a uniqueness in its atmosphere, colors and duration, leaving a different impression behind while sharing a similarly simple, cyclic pattern. It also reminds me of the ways people meet people, being apart after sharing some moments together for a while in a dreamlike half reality - some are peaceful and calm, some are sorrowful and poignant - but all moving in repetition in the transient moments of life. These moments are fleeting and diminishing like a short-life canon, to be destined to disappear into silence, but are so beautiful and unforgettable - since they are ephemeral, since we are living it - not like observing from outside.
