Composition / Avant-Garde

Xenakis Edition volume 10 and the first complete recording of Iannis Xenakis's string quartets, played by the JACK Quartet: Tetras, Tetora, ST/4-1,080262 and Ergma, the last quartet, released on CD and surround-sound DVD.

First recording of Peter Ablinger's 33-127 (2002) for electric guitar and CD, played by Seth Josel: 95 pieces in which a descending scale meets recorded street noise, in just under an hour.

A complete video realization of John Cage's 49 Waltzes for the Five Boroughs by Don Gillespie, Roberta Friedman and Gene Caprioglio, filmed at 147 New York City locations in 1994-95 with durations set by the I-Ching.

Mode's 200th release: John Cage himself performs Empty Words together with Music for Piano (with Yvar Mikhashoff) and the solo work One7, recorded at Buffalo in April 1991 and released for the first time.

DVD of two films by Evans Chan on pianist Margaret Leng Tan: the documentary Sorceress of the New Piano (2004) and the bonus film The Maverick Piano (2007), with performances of Cage, Ge Gan-ru, Satie and Twining and toy piano.

All of John Cage's short works for prepared piano on two CDs, everything except Sonatas and Interludes, played by Philipp Vandré.

Five works by Alvin Lucier for solos and trios on beating tones and microtones: Piper for bagpipe, Fan for four kotos, 947 for flute, Silver Streetcar for triangle and Ever Present for flute, piano and alto saxophone.

Six compositions from 2001-2004 by Tim Hodgkinson, co-founder of Henry Cow, for ensembles, clarinets and electronics, with the Hyperion Ensemble and other guests and Hodgkinson himself on clarinet and bass clarinet.

First CD collection of George Cacioppo's music: six chamber works from 1960-66 including Time on Time in Miracles, Advance of the Fungi and Holy Ghost Vacuum or America Faints, played by French ensembles, with Cacioppo himself on electric organ.

Six works by Mexican composers born between 1957 and 1977, for string quartet and solo violin, recorded in 2002 at the first Radar festival in Mexico City by the Arditti Quartet and Irvine Arditti.

First recording of John Cage's Chess Pieces (1944), rediscovered in a painting and transcribed by Margaret Leng Tan, with her recording of Sonatas and Interludes and the first recording of Vittorio Rieti's Chess Serenade.

All of Xenakis's chamber music for strings except the quartets, from Syrmos (1959) to the first recording of Ittidra (1996), played by Ensemble Resonanz under Johannes Kalitzke, with John Eckhardt on solo contrabass in Theraps.

Chamber music by Mexican composer Hilda Paredes, 1998-2001, drawing on Mayan language and culture: works for string quartet, piano quintet, 21 musicians and vocal quartet, with the Arditti Quartet and Ensemble Modern.

First recording of all 44 Harmonies from Cage's Apartment House 1776, arranged for string quartet by Irvine Arditti and played by the Arditti Quartet, with Arditti's solo violin performance of Cheap Imitation.

Composer-supervised first recordings of Joël-François Durand's music on the four elements: La terre et le feu for oboe and ensemble, Les raisons des forces mouvantes for organ, La mesure des choses III and Athanor for orchestra.

Four films on John Cage by Frank Scheffer and Andrew Culver, gathered as From Zero: 19 Questions, Fourteen with the Ives Ensemble, Paying Attention and Overpopulation and Art with Ryoanji, plus extras.

Elliott Carter's Quintet for Piano and Strings, Quintet for Piano and Winds, Syringa, Tempo e Tempi and two miniatures, recorded under his supervision for his 95th birthday with Ursula Oppens, the Arditti Quartet and Ensemble Sospeso.

All of Christian Wolff's works for violin and piano: the first recording of Pebbles (1999) and two performances of Duo for Violinist and Pianist (1961), played by the Canadian duo Sabat/Clarke with the composer present.

Alain Bancquart's large-scale microtonal cycle on the myth of the Minotaur, on texts by Marie-Claire Bancquart, recorded at its world premiere of the complete version at Radio France on 27 May 2000.

Giacinto Scelsi's music for high winds, solo and duo pieces for clarinet, flute, piccolo and oboe written between 1953 and 1970, played by Carol Robinson, Clara Novakova and Cathy Milliken. Volume 3 of Mode's Scelsi Edition.

First volume of Mode's Luc Ferrari series: Chansons pour le corps, built on interviews with women recorded in the Jardin du Luxembourg, and the symphonic tale Et si tout entière maintenant for actress, tapes and orchestra.

John Cage's Sonatas and Interludes for prepared piano played by Philipp Vandré, the first recording on a Steinway “O”-type baby grand, the piano Cage composed on, with corrections to discrepancies in the printed score.

Vocal works by Luciano Berio, among them Folk Songs, Sequenza III, Chamber Music, O King and Circles, sung by Christine Schadeberg with Musicians Accord, reissued with the first recording of Quattro Canzoni Popolari.

First recording of the second half of John Cage's Freeman Etudes for violin, Books Three and Four, played by Irvine Arditti, the second release in his traversal of Cage's complete violin works for Mode. Released 1989.

John Cage's Freeman Etudes, Books 1 and 2 (the first sixteen etudes for solo violin), played by Irvine Arditti at blistering speed under the composer's supervision.

Debut recital by Argentinean pianist Haydée Schvartz with piano works by Pärt, Berio, Scelsi, Kagel, Cage, Gandini and Valverde, including first recordings of Berio's Brin and Leaf and Cage's Perpetual Tango.

Margaret Leng Tan's second recording, on piano: Cage's Primitive and In the Name of the Holocaust (first recordings), Hovhaness, Crumb, Satoh's Cosmic Womb for two pianos with digital delay, and Ge Gan-ru's Gu Yue. Released in 1988.

Starting with his music of the 1960s and early 1970s, with works such as For 1, 2 or 3 People (1964), the Prose Collection (1968–71), and Changing the System (1974), Christian Wolff (b. 1934) quietly re-invented chamber music. He created music in which the activities of the performers— timing, cueing, assembling and selecting materials—were foregrounded. Although to some extent these activities were always a part of classical music, Wolff opened them up for creative decision-making by the musici…

**200 copies limited edition** Live recording from Dirk Serries’ Tonus project, which explores long-form, minimal, graphic score pieces.

Thirteen first recordings of early Feldman works from 1950 to 1953, including Intersection for magnetic tape, the Music for Jackson Pollock film score with Pollock's narration, Nature Pieces and Variations, played by pianist Philipp Vandré and the Turfan Ensemble.

Saturations is a composition by Danish multidisciplinary artist Niels Lyhne Løkkegaard, and features a clarinet choir consisting of 19(!) clarinet players. Niels Lyhne Løkkegaard (b. 1979) considers his work to be a basic research in realities working within the domains of imaginary & physical sound as well as other non-sonic media, and since 2012 Niels Lyhne Løkkegaard has experimented with creating music that lets the instruments transcend their inherent sonic norms and reappear in another for…

Formed in 2017, J Pavone String Ensemble features Jessica Pavone and Abby Swidler on violas, and Erica Dicker and Angela Morris on violins. The group's latest release, Lost And Found, combines both traditional notation and improvisation, with a focus on sustained collaborative playing and the application of ideas exploring the healing potential of sonic vibrations. It was recorded at Firehouse 12 in New Haven, Connecticut. Speaking with The Wire's Philip Clark in November 2019, Pavone describes …

An unexpected musical combination of two masterpieces of modern music rethought through the use of contemporary electronic instruments that marvels at lively and innovative sounds, in the version with keyboards and electronics presented at Terraforma Festival 2019.

Mostly first recordings of Henry Cowell's music written for dance, many from unpublished manuscripts, including Atlantis, the Ritournelles from Marriage at the Eiffel Tower, Sound Form No. 1 and the Suite for Woodwind Quintet.

The debut recording of Israeli-born composer Chaya Czernowin: five chamber works from 1988 to 1996, including a string quartet and Afatsim for nonet, played by Sonor, the Arditti Quartet and Japanese and American soloists.

Hilda Paredes's chamber opera The Seventh Seed, on the Persephone legend to a libretto by Karen Whiteson, recorded with the Arditti Quartet and Steven Schick, plus two realizations of Permutaciones for solo violin played by Irvine Arditti.

As a composer, David Dunn is probably best known for his interdisciplinary work that crosses the boundaries between art and science. This has included the fields of acoustic ecology, bioacoustics, interspecies communication and scientific sonification while creating a body of innovative sound work that has contributed to projects as diverse as sensory enhancement of healthcare environments and intervention strategies for forest and agricultural pests. He has invented microphones to record such p…

How many sounds can a piano produce without using the keyboard? Some answers can be found in this recording, where the whole instrument is investigated using different techniques to reveal a world of unexpected richness, textures, and resonances.But it’s not just that: it’s also a journey in what the concept of “piano” became in the imagination of three composers (and a pianist). Each, in fact, gave shape to an original sonorous universe, and the task of reconnecting the subtle threads between c…

Osaka-born and New York-based pianist Erika Dohi is a multi-faceted artist with an eclectic musical background. From highly polished traditional classical to bold improvisation, she is a dynamic performer whose timeless style and unidiomatic technique sets her apart in contemporary NYC avant-garde circles. Dohi’s vast repertory is impressive, but what makes her truly such a barrier-defying artist is what lies ahead. I, Castorpollux, Dohi’s debut solo album, is a profound personal excavation set …

Putojefe Records is proud to present Vortice Rosso, the first album by Italian composer Flavio Bonometti: a tumultuous journey through the languages of the avant-garde masterfully synthesized in 12 pieces of contemporary classical. After a brilliant career as a violist at La Scala Theatre in Milan and in many other orchestras, Flavio Bonometti gave up the stage to dedicate himself exclusively to his music. The tracks of Vortice Rosso, produced and recorded over the last 10 years, are born from t…