Cornelius Cardew (1936-1981) - A Life Unfinished
Hardback cover edition, 1070 pages (!) Cornelius Cardew was a musician of genius for whom Life and Art were as one. He was a radical, both artistically and politically, becoming a tireless activist and uncompromising Marxist-Leninist. Passion and imagination governed all he did: his boldness and humanity continue to intrigue and inspire.
John Tilbury, whose close friendship with Cardew dates from their first concert together, in January 1960, has worked for many years on this biography, and brin…
Beats
The work of LA based music-maker John Krausbauer has so much to do with minimalism as with trance music as with soundart experimentation and "performance based" sound forms. And where, as he himself states, the "Trance-Psychedelia is the aim and goal". Firmly rooted in the 60s/70s Minimalist movement of LaMonte Young and The Theater of Eternal Music, as well as the trajectory out of that...(with the likes of Conrad, Flynt, Wada, Palestine, Chatham; Oliveros, Radigue etc etc), "beats" also touch …
Works with Guitar
Aldo Clementi's works with guitar, the first complete CD devoted to them, played by Geoffrey Morris and the ELISION Ensemble: Serenata, Dodici Variazioni, Albumblatt, The Plaint and others, most of them first recordings.
Turfan Fragments
Originally released in 2001 by the Dog W/A Bone label, this release features these 2 long pieces: For Samuel Beckett and The Turfan Fragments. Performed by: The Orchestra of the S.E.M. Ensemble, with Petr Kotik, conductor. For Samuel Beckett and The Turfan Fragments are Morton Feldman's only chamber orchestra compositions. Both were commissions: The Turfan Fragments by the Swiss-Italian Radio Orchestra in 1980, For Samuel Beckett by the Schönberg Ensemble, Amsterdam, in 1987. Both titles are des…
H1KhH2WM (Du Seuil), a Five-letter Sufi Word
The third chapter in the Sufi Word's series. Jean-Luc Fafchamps
on the release: "The Sufi Letters is a vast project of 28 compositions
(for the 28 letters of the Arabic alphabet) undertaken in 2000 and still
ongoing. I am drawing inspiration from the symbolic charts found in
Sufi mysticism. Each Letter is a sonic meditation on the frontiers of
conscience and the paradoxes of time. Today's word, 'Du seuil' ('From
the threshold'), is the third word to be released by Sub Rosa. It is a
journe…
Es Schwindelt Mir, Es Brennt Mein Eingeweide
Es Schwindelt Mir, Es Brennt Mein Eingeweide ("I’m Dizzy, My Viscera Burns") finds Swedish composer Magnus Granberg refining his art of meditative ensemble writing in a single long-form work. Drawing inspiration from Schubert’s "Die Winterreise," Granberg selects and processes melodic fragments, filtering them through his unique syntax of open-form composition and collective improvisation. Rather than direct quotation, the references to Schubert are spectral: shuffled and stretched, turned into …
Harmonium
Just Asked whether he would describe his music as “Sound for the sake of sound,” James Tenney (1934–2006) replied, “It’s sound for the sake of perceptual insight—some kind of perceptual revelation.” This release aptly demonstrates Tenney’s deep exploratory fascination with the nature and potentialities of aural perception. His attraction to these topics was simultaneously intellectual and sensuous, and its musical products at once invite both sustained reflection and the most immediate of corpor…
North of North
Instruments which sound like instruments!!! Unbelievable real-time compositions for the unlikely instrumentation of piano, trumpet and violin courtesy of North Of North: Anthony Pateras, Scott Tinkler and Erkki Veltheim.Drawing from improvisation, Carnatic music, 20th and 21st century compositional strategies, mathematical theories and open forms of jazz, their music is fused together by virtuosic instrumentalism, critical listening and a shared philosophy of musical and physical discipline. The…
Early To Late
Early to Late presents an inspired commission for Magnus Granberg and Jürg Frey, inviting each to compose for Ensemble Grizzana using the same brief: build a new work from Renaissance fragments. Granberg’s “How Vain Are All Our Frail Delights?” draws on William Byrd’s choral music, transforming melodic kernels into shimmering, spectral textures. Ensemble voices - celesta, glass harp, dulcimer, violin, winds - float through cycles of open-form improvisation and carefully weighted silence. The res…
Dream, American Music for Electric Guitar
Sergio Sorrentino plays American music for electric guitar by Cage, Feldman, Wolff, Lang, Vees, Sharp, Curran, Polansky and Stiefel, including the first CD release of Feldman's The Possibility of a New Work for Electric Guitar.
Gong Gongs
**Warehouse find, still sealed original copies 1987 edition** Gong action suported by catalan fussion percussionist Santi Arisa. Main attraction here is the percussions and electronics piece Secuencia I.
Muntzers Stern, Solo II
Jakob Ullmann has made the orchestral work "steine, feuer, sterne" (stones, fire, stars) based on a modular structure, such that individual sections can be played outside of a complete performance, solo or in predetermined combinations; this album presents one section for solo bassoon titled "Muntzers stern" performed by Dafne Vicente-Sandoval.From the liner notes by Hans-Peter Schulz; Translation by Peter Gebert: Solo II is part of a group of works with the title Buch der Stille 1 ('Book of Sil…
Pianos Quart de Ton
Works for 2 and 4 pianos tuned a 1/4 tone apart, ondes Martenot and cello. Ivan Wyschnegradsky, “4e Fragment symphonique op.38c” for ondes Martenot and 4 pianos (1956), “Ainsi parlait Zarathoustra op.17” for 4 pianos (1930/1936). World premiere recording. “Méditation sur deux thèmes de la Journée de l’Existence op.7” for cello and piano 1/2 ton (1918/1976). Alain Moëne, “De l’ange for 2 pianos” (2015). First performance. Alain Bancquart, “Racines for 4 pianos” (2014). First performance..‘I c…
Where Are We Going, Today
Christian Wolff, piano, objects, charango, flute. Antoine Beuger, voice, whistles, EWR recordings (1995) of Christian Wolff’s “Stones”.Antoine Beuger started composing music in 1990 and has released on his own label, Edition Wandelweiser Records, as well as Erstwhile Records. Beuger’s work is best exemplified by two releases, his first, Calme Étendue (Spinoza) and A Young Person’s Guide to Antoine Beuger. Calme Étendue (Spinoza) is an album that attempts to take the 17th century philosopher Spin…
Choices & Melodies
“Choices & Melodies” regroup two pieces, composed by Cyril Bondi and d’incise and echoing in a different aspects the “13 & 27” CD recently released by Another Timbre, as both were recorded at the same time in the summer 2016. With “Two choices” the Insub Meta Orchestra exposes its richness of sonic production and variety of sources, acoustic and electronic, with simple instruction of producing two noises per person and the possibility of a change every five seconds. From this rigid structu…
Landfall
Laurie Anderson and Kronos Quartet's Landfall, inspired by her experience of Hurricane Sandy, is the first collaboration between the iconic storyteller/musician and the groundbreaking string quartet, who perform together on the recording. Landfall juxtaposes lush electronics and traditional strings by Kronos with Anderson\'s powerful descriptions of loss, from water-logged pianos to disappearing animal species to Dutch karaoke bars. The Washington Post calls it "riveting, gorgeous."
Complete Early Percussion Works
Karlheinz Stockhausen's early percussion works on two CDs: Zyklus, Kontakte for piano and percussion with tape, Mikrophonie for tam-tam, Refrain and Schlagtrio, with new transfers from the analog tapes.
The Orchestral Works 2
Three orchestral works by Giacinto Scelsi recorded in Vienna in 2005: Quattro Pezzi (su una nota sola), Uaxuctum, and the first recording of La Nascita del Verbo, with the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra and choirs.
A Cage of saxophones 1
Cage's late works for saxophones, Four5, Five4 and Hymnkus, with Ulrich Krieger's arrangements of Ryoanji and Five, played by Krieger and German new music performers. Volume 24 of the Complete John Cage Edition.
Ascension to Purgatory
Recent works by Gerard Pape, 1998-2004, for voices, percussion, computer, amplified strings and ensemble, with Roland Auzet, Rohan de Saram, Irvine Arditti and others, on his third monographic CD for Mode.