Music from Czech Republic

Iva Bittová, Gyan Riley and Evan Ziporyn as Eviyan, live at Victoriaville on 16 May 2013: violin, voice and kalimba, acoustic guitar and clarinets in songs between Moravian folk, minimalism and chamber music.

Tip! “For the first duo release, Birgit Ulher stays close to her primary instrument, the trumpet. She plays that, as per usual, in combination with a radio, speakers and a voice changer. Early February 2020, she recorded a duet with Petr Vrba, also on trumpet and electronics, during a two-day met in Hamburg. Both musicians have quite a reputation when it comes to playing improvised music. Well, maybe improvised music covers only partially what they do. The addition of electronics and objects mak…

Milan Knízak canonical text Aktual University, dating from 1967, contains ten short lectures outlining the university's character -- On Conflict, On Dreams, On Revolutions, On Love, On Belief, On Art, etc. These lectures were to serve as inspirational schemes for lectures, seminars and discussions held at an ideal university. In the first piece, Aktual University, Milan Knízak reads his own text, with Opening Performance Orchestra providing the musical accompaniment. It was performed live in Oct…

** Edition of 65 ** Shakali's first album 'Petojen Tavat' was recorded during 2016-2020 in Imatra (Finland) and Brno (Czech Republic). Enigmatic ambient works with a dreamy tribal essence. “These contemplative psychedelic tracks were recorded layer by layer, peacefully over the years, in the nighttime, with a focus on preserving their original energy and character. Set in circular motion with solar-powered synths, prepared flutes, tapes, percussion, electric violin, field recordings and modular …

The science fiction yearning for utopia sometimes falls into dystopian space. Kurt Liedwart with Ken Ganfield and Petr Vrba tried to follow the impulse of getting to the ideal world but their most powerful and fearful predictions and prophesies came to the fore and “Something Wrong There” happened all the time. Liedwart recently became dissatisfied with the improvisation’s disability to create sonically fresh sound worlds and completely remixed the studio recordings. Did it prevent him from maki…

Petr Vrba explores non-idiomatic improvisation using trumpets, clarinets, vibrating speakers and other electronics which made him one of the most active experimental musicians in Prague. He works with a lot of projects like Prague Improvisation Orchestra, Poisonous Frequencies, NOIZ, Doppeltrio, Rouilleux and Junk & The Beast. “Punkt” is his second release on Mikroton following “Trailer” with Veronika Mayer released in 2017. Kurt Liedwart, a Moscow-based musician and curator of Mikroton Recordin…

Milan Knizak 1979's masterpiece never re-released before. Presented as a gatefold with the original design. Before everyone else - Christian Marclay, Philip Jeck, eRikm, Martin Tétreault, Otomo Yoshihide - there was Milan Knizak. In 1964, Milan Knizak, a member of Fluxus from behind the Iron Curtain, sat down on a sidewalk near the Charles Bridge in Prague, laid down a paper carpet right into the street, and starts tearing pages out of books and burning them. Around the same time, he began to cr…

Violin was Milan Knizak's first instrument. He has composed hundred of works of this ilk; the first one DHK, 45 years ago. Next to his destroyed works, Milan took notations of different composers, cut them and put them together (with his own score) into a collage, expressing his feelings and his apprehension of music.Fama Q is a string quartet founded in 2005 in Prague. Its members, being also orchestral musicians with the Prague Philharmonia, were always devoted to chamber and string quartet mu…

Resonators documents a distinctive trio - George Cremaschi (double bass, electronics), Irene Kepl (violin, electronics), and Petr Vrba (trumpet, clarinet, electronics) - whose central aim is to use the acoustics of resonant spaces as a compositional force. Recorded in a monastery in Bechyne and a hall in Valdstejn Loggia, the album’s four tracks are colored by echo, mingling long droning tones, drifting feedback, and abrupt outbursts with the ambient noises of stone and air. The ensemble’s metho…

Milan Knizak and Opening Performance Orchestra revisit Knizak's 1979 Broken Music (SR 400LP) in Berlin, 2014. "In 2008-9 we transferred the original recording from vinyl records into digital form. As we did so, we weren't interested in the precise, clean fidelity offered by the digital world, which fundamentally causes the fine structure of natural sound to be lost. Instead we were seeking the opposite: the world of errors and distortion, which remains hidden when digital audio is manipulated to…

The tracks of the album Esox lucius were recorded on high end analogue technique at the Czech Radio Broadcasting Studio in Prague. Four exceptional instrumentalists are creating bubbling and zizzling chamber music, they are blurring the edges of their instruments, but contemporarily dialoguing with a precise and unique vocabulary. The record is based on minimal drones, refined with analogue trumpet glitches and extended vocal techniques. Brass is bubbling, feedbacks are shrieking, it sounds as i…

Legendary east block vocalist. Here is 17 tracks of experimental child songs mixed with traditional folky style that are calm and relaxing. Beautiful voice as always.

With voice, violin and percussion, this duo produces music with a thrilling intensity, suspense and drama. The musical basis is a mixture of the duo's interpretation of slovakian and romanian folk music, jazz and classical. They play with a freshness and enthusiasm that leaves the listener breathless.

Iva Bittová has been the guest of many artists all over the world, but this compilation mostly explores her work with her Czech compatriots, including Ida Kelarová, Pavel Fajt and Pluto, Nederlands Blazers Ensemble, Krajinka and Vladimír Godár, as well as some film and theater music and one unique Gregorian chant experiment made expressly for this release. It's a wild range of emotions, techniques and sounds.

Janáček's piano cycle On an Overgrown Path in Daniel Rumler's string orchestra arrangement, with Suk's St. Wenceslas Meditation, Dvořák's Notturno and poems read by Maïa Brami. Camerata Zürich led by Igor Karsko; recorded 2017 at Radiostudio Zürich.

Hungarian pianist Dénes Várjon's first solo ECM New Series album: Berg's Piano Sonata op. 1, Janáček's In the mists and Liszt's Sonata in B minor, recorded in April 2011 at the RSI Auditorio in Lugano and produced by Manfred Eicher.

Debut album of the Italian sisters Natascia (violin) and Raffaella Gazzana (piano), playing Takemitsu's Distance de fée, Hindemith's Sonata in E, Janáček's Sonata and Silvestrov's Five Pieces, recorded in March 2011 at the RSI Auditorio in Lugano.

Duo album by Miroslav Vitous (double bass) and Jan Garbarek (tenor and soprano saxophones), with seven Vitous compositions and two joint improvisations. Recorded February 1992 at Rainbow Studio, Oslo, produced by Manfred Eicher.

Third ECM album by Miroslav Vitous's quartet, with John Surman (reeds), John Taylor (piano) and Jon Christensen (drums), recorded at Talent Studio, Oslo, in July 1982, produced by Manfred Eicher and released in 1983.

Cooperative trio of Terje Rypdal (guitar, guitar synthesizer, organ), Miroslav Vitous (double bass, electric piano) and Jack DeJohnette (drums), recorded in June 1978 at Talent Studio, Oslo, produced by Manfred Eicher. First released 1979.