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Bad Boy\'s Piano Music
George Antheil was not only always ahead of his time; he was also an alert contemporary and ready to take in all artistic trends of the first half of the 20th century. There was hardly a kind of music he wasn't aware of, hardly a madness he didn't take part in, and hardly a scandal he missed, or missed to cause. All his personal entanglements are certainly reflected in his compositions – and we wouldn't expect any less from him; but his continuing reputation as a genuinely unique character is ne…
String Quartets Vol. 3 (Nos. 7-9)
String Quartets Nos. 7, 8 and 9 suggest that Rihm has finally left behind the neo-romantic expressive pathos of earlier compositions: “Real or virtual allusions to the past are rarely to be found any more – and the same holds of the luscious and revelling strings. Remnants of tonal harmony are, with a few exceptions, almost completely obliterated. … Instead, new constellations come to the fore, emancipated from traditional conceptions of sound – heeding, in particular, the principle of polarity …
Symphony No. 3
Charles Ives (1874-1954) earned his living by selling insurance policies to his contemporaries. Besides, he took a great interest in literature, philosophy and, first and foremost, music. And what came of it? The most original modernist music one could imagine. Ives's Third Symphony was inspired by his memory of camp meetings, the Christian "evangelistic gatherings" common in his youth. However bizarre these meetings may appear to us, they were a familiar feature of rural America especially duri…
Vita di San Francesco
When, in the summer of 1992, Lutz-Werner Hesse visited St. Francis’s hometown in Umbria, he was deeply moved by Giotto’s frescos in the Basilica. Using prints of the frescos, Hesse later developed a dramatic sequence, which was meant to serve as the basis for a composition revolving around the life of the saint. Gongs had always held a special fascination for Hesse. So, for this piece, he pitted 13 gongs against one organ: “The organ, I thought, is a particularly suitable partner for the gongs s…
Untitled #188
Back in stock! 'Mutated, composed, recorded and mastered by Francisco López at Mobile Messor (Madrid, Bucharest, Montreal), spring-summer 2006. Original source environmental recordings done in Montreal: between 2000 and 2006 by Francisco López, and in April 2006 by Hélène Prévost, Steve Heimbecker, Louis Dufour, Tomas Phillips, Chantal Dumas, Aimé Dontigny and Mathieu Levesque, within the project 'Montreal Sound Matter'; conceived and directed by Francisco López; commissioned and organized…
Musica Viva 06
"Musica Viva 06" is another excellent release from the German Col Legno label, which specializes in the avant-garde. This disc includes three live performances -- the original 1981 recording of "Ais," featuring the incredible baritone voice of Spyros Sakkas, a new recording of "Troorkh," a trombone concerto, from 2000, and (drumroll please...) the world premiere of "Anastenaria," also from 2000, with the inimitable Xenakis champion Charles Bornstein conducting. As it turns out, "Metastas…
THIS PLACE IS DREAMING
An attempt to convert Brussels' sonic reality into music. Mutated environmental sound materials gathered in Brussels, remixes of interviews with inhabitants and extracts of installations are flanked with atmospheric compositions made with sounds from other cities and countries.
Konzert für Violine und Orchester / Fasce
Rhapsodic, lyrical, virtuoso, and, in the end, even amusing: all these attributes come to mind as Cerha's violin concerto is finished off with a charming punch line.
Red Morocco
Someday someone will write a history of modern music that will free us of the false dichotomies such as high vs. low, improviser vs. composer, classical vs. everything else… …The written materials Joe passed out to the musicians for Red Morocco was minimal, sometimes more visual than musical, but always modest. Everyone was seated in the same room, in a circle. The music heard on this recording occurred late in the day, when Joe felt a certain clarity was occurring……The results are an elegant,…
Beasts Of No Nation / O.D.O.O.
After helping Fela Anikulapo Kuti with Teacher Don't Teach Me Nonsense, Wally Badarou then produced Beasts of No Nation. Another album that has been combined with this one is the 31-minute "ODOO (Overtake Don Overtake Overtake).
WOOF 7 INCHES
This CD comprises all four 7" releases by the British underground label, WOOF RECORDS, plus extra tracks by THE WORK and THE LOWEST NOTE. All tracks were originally released on vinyl between 1980 and 1985, but most have never before been issued on CD. This disk features a who's-who of the London art-rock scene from those years (Bill Gilonis, Mick Hobbs, Tim Hodgkinson, Rick Wilson, Andy Bole, Trefor Goronwy, to name a few), plus the Belgian expressionist-singer, CATHERINE JAUNIAUX.Disk Includes:…
String Quartets Vol.1
This CD with … the first four string quartets reflects the interesting path of Rihm’s artistic development. The Minguet Quartet approaches the first two, shorter, works with audibly high concentration without relinquishing, in the frenzy of high-energy playing, their own cultivated sound born from quartet tradition. Here, Rihm’s third quartet, with its not unproblematic subtitle ‘Im Innersten’ (‘at the innermost core’), does not become self-indulgent navel-gazing, the display of sounding extremi…
![Ekphrasis [Continuo II] / Coro](https://cdn.soundohm.com/data/products/013/luciano-berio-ekphrasis-continuo-ii-cor.jpg.500.jpg)
Ekphrasis [Continuo II] / Coro
The renowned American architects Sullivan, Wright and Mies van der Rohe are the center of attention in the composition Ekphrasis [Continuo II], even though originally Berio had no such thing in mind: "While I was working on Continuo, it was not my intention to compose a metaphor for architecture, or write a homage to the famous Chicago architects... Neither did I refer directly to the amusing but nevertheless solid constructions by Renzo Piano... However, as the work progressed I became aware th…
Quando Stanno Morendo
Works of art are often triggered by private events. Sarà dolce tacere (1960), for example, was written on the occasion of the 40th birthday of Bruno Maderna, Nono's (former) teacher and close friend; and also in 1960 Nono wrote Ha venido for his daughter's first birthday. Djamila Boupachà (1962), ¿Dónde estás, hermano? (1982) and Quando stanno morendo (1982), on the other hand, are clearly expressions attributable to the politically involved, the committed cosmopolitan Nono.
Allegro Sostenuto / Pression / Dal Niente / Intérieur I
Both Sostenuto and Dal niente were composed for the clarinetist Eduard Brunner. “As in the earlier Ausklang for piano and orchestra, the musical material is determined by the interplay of the experiences of resonance on the one hand and motion on the other. Both aspects of sound encounter one another in the conception of structure as a multiply ambivalent ‘arpeggio’, i.e. as a process of construction, deconstruction and reconstruction – experienced in temporal succession – which is conveyed both…
Das tapfere Schneiderlein
Drop the usual children's opera platitudes, add a liberal measure of cheek – result: a smart musical comedy, young and saucy, just like the brave little people that go about their business here. Do the children today know at all what this fairytale is about? Well, if they don't, Wolfgang Mitterer will bring it home to them, with just a few characteristic instruments: double bass, samples, synthetic sounds. Elisabeth Rombach as the little tailor takes to the road boldly and merrily, parading the …
Certainty of Swarms
'The fusion of metal, noise rock, free jazz, industrial, and harsh electronics that makes up The certainty of swarms is the rare kind of heterogeneous concoction that is carefully matured, but never lost in pedestrian calculation. A blistering onslaught of metallic-fused noise-murk, swarms is considered by the band to be one of their most complete statements to date, an aptly blindsiding and developed work drawing from all quarters of their craft.'
Sugar tip
Last winter, when BLOODYMINDED was preparing to go on tour in the U.K., I was put in contact with Lee Stokoe, who was touring at the same time as us, under the name Inseminoid, with George Proctor of Mutant Ape. Not only was Lee beyond accommodating about letting us piggyback on the Inseminoid/Fecalove tour, but he was kind enough to also drive us around the U.K. for several days. I returned to the States with a thick stack of Culver CDs, which took some time to get through. I was most pleased t…
Jättiläisrotta
The burgeoning Finnish free-folk movement has been garnering much praise & attention over the past year. First CD release by Avarus who play a left-field blend of noise, folk & free jazz. From the same circle of psychos who bring us Kemialliset Ystavat, Maniac's Dream, Pylon & the Anaksimandros. Backward, dirt-eating freak folk that makes the Animal Collective sound like Judy Collins.