Anatomy is a portrait of Mark Barden, whose music works at the thresholds of perception. Subtle deviations, fleeting swarms of detail and sustained textures dominate these recordings, which range from a duo for two piccolos to a work for percussion and large orchestra. In all of them Barden hunts for extremes, of stillness and of violence.
The performers are the flutists Matteo Cesari and Helen Bledsoe, the clarinettist Carl Rosman, the bassoonist Lorelei Dowling, the violinist Ashot Sarkissjan, the cellist Séverine Ballon and the pianist Joseph Houston. ensemble mosaik plays under Enno Poppe, and the percussionist Brian Archinal appears with the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin conducted by Peter Rundel. Almost all of the recordings are coproductions of Deutschlandfunk Kultur and the German Music Council. The booklet text is by Paul Griffiths.
Veil unfolds at the edge of silence: two piccolos wrap around each other, layering pitched and breath sounds like a veil caught in shimmering air. Other pieces take volatile sounds from the extreme registers, sounds on the verge of explosion or implosion. cleft, a long string duo played with ferocious intensity by Sarkissjan and Ballon, sits on the threshold between fusion and splitting. Barden asks whether the gap between cleft layers might not be empty but rage with chaotic violence. In aMass, for amplified nonet, three very different trios produce a dense, self-similar mass of sound that grows to a brutal, sustained climax.
The smaller line-ups frame this violence in a sharp, rarefied way, while the ensemble and orchestral works occupy a broader, heavier space. The title work anatomy, for percussion solo and large orchestra, is an early orchestral piece. Between these poles sit personæ for bass flute and bass clarinet, lamentoso for piccolo and bassoon, and three piano Études titled Velocity Gauge, Mirrors, Masks and On Affect and Nostalgia.
CD, Wergo WER 6434 2, released in 2021 in the German Music Council's Edition Zeitgenössische Musik, total time 76 minutes.
