Catherine Lamb
Catherine Lamb is an active composer exploring the interaction of tone, summations of shapes and shadows, phenomenological expansions, the architecture of the liminal (states in between outside/inside), and the long introduction form
Catherine Lamb is an active composer exploring the interaction of tone, summations of shapes and shadows, phenomenological expansions, the architecture of the liminal (states in between outside/inside), and the long introduction form
Curva Triangulus
Catherine Lamb works at the boundary between perception and illusion. In Curva Triangulus (2018/21), the American composer takes Bridget Riley's geometric forms as starting point for "warping" Renaissance materials through geometric musical figures. The result is a 41-minute composition for eight instruments where the distinction between melody and harmony dissolves: one generates the other, rather than existing as separate entities.
The score demands an exceptional ensemble. Bern's Ensemble Pro…
parallaxis forma
Three vocal works recorded between 2014 and 2020 reveal the Berlin-based American composer's singular approach to voice as spectral instrument. Lotte Betts-Dean, Explore Ensemble, and Exaudi navigate Lamb's radiant harmonic language where phonemes replace text, vowel sounds emphasize overtone clusters, and the human voice blends seamlessly with bowed strings shifting between pure tone and noise.
color residua opens with four sections where composite melodies emerge through slow hocket between si…
Translucent Harmonies
New York-based duo andPlay – violinist Maya Bennardo and violist Hannah Levinson – present two extended works exploring the sonic possibilities of just intonation tuning systems. Both pieces were commissioned for andPlay's concert series Translucent Harmonies and premiered in 2018.
Catherine Lamb's Prisma Interius VIII (Melodic Duo) (22 minutes) strips her Prisma Interius series down to its bare essence, removing the electronic spectral resonance of earlier versions. Here, violin and viola plot …
The Harmonic Series Volume 2
A collection of long-form works in just intonation by Kali Malone, Duane Pitre, Catherine Lamb, Tashi Wada, Byron Westbrook, and Caterina Barbieri. Mastered by Stephan Mathieu
Prisma Interius VII & VIII
* Edition of 500 * In Catherine Lamb's Prisma Interius series the unpredictability of the outside articulates the field of perception through precise bandpass filters, while acoustic instruments and musicians guide the unfolding of its harmonic space. A series of nine pieces exploring the potential of the Secondary Rainbow synthesizer, an instrument developed in 2016-2017 with Bryan Eubanks, that uses the live environment outside the performance space as a noise generator for basic subtractive s…
Point/Wave
Point/Wave represents a rare confluence of precision and open inquiry, as Catherine Lamb’s composition for Cristián Alvear translates the enigmatic condition of sound into tactile experience. Commissioned by Alvear and realized on Another Timbre, Lamb’s score meditates on her signature just intonation, deploying the Secondary Rainbow Synthesizer to generate four environmental chords that breathe around the guitar’s modally tuned strings. The electronics hum and fade - reflecting timbral shifts f…
Viola Torros
Viola Torros is more than a historical reference - it is an ongoing collaboration between Catherine Lamb and Johnny Chang, centered around the research, arrangement, and interpretation of fragments attributed to the mysterious composer Viola Torros. While the project suggests an archaeological recovery of lost medieval works filtered through Arabic, Byzantine, and Indian modal traditions, the underlying narrative is a playful fiction - Torros herself appears to be a fictional construct, allowing…