August 2010
1 post
Classical Music Magazine Feature July 2010
May 2010
29 posts
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Ring carbons
The ring carbon atoms in substituted benzenes exert a larger attraction on the valency electron cloud of the hydrogen atom resulting in an increase in the C-H force constant and a decrease in the corresponding bond length. I’m on the train, and that’s how it reads on the laptop of my next-seat neighbor. I thought you wanted to know. I’m also sure that you’d want to know...
Meticulously written down spontaneous folk music
Is prog a dirty word for you? Ok, I will try not to bore you with childhood reminiscences again. But here we have one more guy who meant a lot to me when I was little. My favorite record is Gravity from 1980, and as I’ve made you buy no more than four or five records while writing this blog, get that and we’re cool. Since then, Fred Frith has done a lot of stuff. He has become a...
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Hypnagogic jazz
This morning I rode a shuttle with Andy Hamilton of The Wire. I wasn’t quite there yet, else I’d have brought up a serious subject you’d all be very interested in. Instead we mostly discussed the toad in the hotel pond which is quite the discovery of the festival. I mean, he croaks in tongues. He’s just so happy to have conquered a kingdom that I suspect it hasn’t...
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Not a single straight note
I’m sorry, I’ll have to take you deep into my past. I’m the kind of guy that has A Taste of DNA on vinyl. That’s Lindsay’s no wave band from a long time ago. Can’t say I enjoyed it much, but when I was little, it was an important statement for me to have it. By the time I was aware enough to follow his moves, Lindsay played with the Golden Palominos and his...
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We want our Tyshawn back
Strange gig from Tyshawn Sorey so far. Well, not really strange. It’s good music, Ingrid Laubrock and Kris Davis are on form, most of the material is written by Sorey and sounds distinct, they don’t just play stuff, they are a band, but … Tyshawn Sorey does not play like Tyshawn Sorey. I mean like I think he should. That static groove thing, that Steve Coleman thing with the...
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A sense of privacy
Back on the big stage a set from Mari Kvien Brunvoll. She sits alone on stage, with a loopstation and some small instruments, and plays music with herself that depends on a certain sense of privacy. Tough enough in such packed house even without cameramen bustling about, which is why she didn’t want a stream. That’s unfortunate, but it makes sense.
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The sweetest melodies
Now that was amazing. Brilliant. If awesome would still mean anything, that would be the word. I’m sitting here pointing at something that is too great for words, making funny noises. I’m still in shock.
This was one of the side events, therefore unfortunately unstreamed, a trio of Peter Brötzmann, Mats Gustafsson, and Ken Vandermark at the protestant church here. Let me get this...
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The shadow of the girl on the flying trapeze
Oh, and I just notice I have a picture which sort of shows what Paolo Angeli was after yesterday. I listened in on an interview he did later, and he’s quite serious about wanting to enchant us all, about the spiritual background, and the fact that everybody involved is friends or family. Here he’s contemplating the shadow of the girl on the flying trapeze.
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The middle of the road
Toshi Reagon & BigLovely. Before I start bitching again, let me quote a tech who shall remain anonymous: “This music lacks any kind of character. I don’t know, the main acts are quite weak somehow.” Amen to that. Everybody had fun, though.
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Campfire music
We had advance warning. Bill Frisell and Arve Henrikson had never ever played together, not in public, and not even in a practice room. They blithely took the stage and drove the first number against a tree firmly. What they did with the wreck of that was not exactly great music, but their attempt to make something work, and above all, to entertain the audience, was so honest and likeable, that...
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Orotund sonorities
This is the second time today I see Paolo Angeli. He’s in completely different mode now, hammering out bass notes (on the one) while elegiacally bowing his Sardinian guitar (think an acoustic Sigur Rós). He’s accompanied by Takumi Fukushima on viola and very grungy vocals and Ganesh Anandan on frame drum and whistling. They do some kind of faux folk laced with lazy soundtrack muzak. ...
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Ghost voices
So. What can I say. He came, saw, and delivered. And, one has to add, he looks really good. That was the first thing I thought, what a beautiful man. It’s become sort of a critical trope to stress that the old firebrand these days also plays surprisingly tender passages. (Which is not really surprising if you’ve heard Schwarzwaldfahrt from 1977 with Han Bennink. Hey, I think...
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A lifetime of tinnitus
I have a confession to make. I didn’t go see Grubenklang, although with Frank Gratkowski they had a true Plush artist in their midst. How can you ever forgive me. Instead I went to the Concerts in the Dark series because I wanted to hear John Wall. Definitely worth it. He began with waveforms crashing on a digital shore. (This is pure computer music, where Wall improvises with prepared...
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The Teufelsgeiger mode
Paolo Angeli’s modified Sardinian guitar is a thing of beauty. It has the head of a violin rammed into its guitar head, carrying a set of slack strings that lead to a double bass bridge glued unto the body right above the endpin of a cello. It has five footpedals that trigger metal claws which beat on the strings. It has a little motored ventilator inside which plucks at the strings in an...
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Pop acts
Wait. Let me get back to the Miss Platnum show I copped out of yesterday. She does pop with a heavily Balkan tinge. My difficulty with this is: I have seen Fanfare Ciocarlia. They take no prisoners. Their music is wild and woolly, but still they have no problem with a mainstream audience, on the contrary, even uptight folks like me start shaking their booty. Their kind of music has nothing to...
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Every move counts
That was good. How was that so good. It was just Bill Frisell, Eyvind Kang, and a drummer named Rudy Royston having fun. They played a rock number, they played something from Mali (which I can’t point my finger to, though I have that song somewhere), they even played a jump tune where Frisell suddenly remembered a whole book of Charlie Christian licks. It didn’t come across as that...
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Savour the note
Spectacular gig by the Steve Lehman Octet. I wish they would let up now and then. This is the first time I see Tyshawn Sorey on drums. Spectacular. I wish he would let up now and then. (He has a nagging snare, I love that.) Will he play like that on his own gig? I’m totally impressed. But I do think I’d prefer the record where I suspect they maybe will let up now and then and savour...
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Strange objects
Ok, Carlo Mombelli and the Prisoners of Strange just wasn’t for me. Thick electric bass, mostly ostinati, now and then leaving that for jazz rock licks, over that some sub Jon Hassell trumpet sound (I’m not talking about the playing, I didn’t have sufficient patience to analyze that), plus the band’s only asset, Siya Makuzeni on trombone and vocals. Well, I can’t...
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Sloppy alliances
Really nice set from trumpeter Sanne van Hek’s new group. (Ahm, if that sounds like I knew the name five minutes ago, I didn’t. She’s now composer in residence in Moers, no idea how heavy that is.) It began like a live emulation of trying out your new loopstation. The first layer was some crackle from a computer, then a few bass notes, trumpet and bari, piano, trumpet sampled...
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Don't hear me
I sure am a mean bastard. These guys are all in their early 20s. They have a funny name: Super Seaweed Sex Scandal. Now if everybody in their early 20s were in such a band the world would be a better place. They have quite smart compositions. They know all the moves, they can do the skronk, they can do the half contemporary classical, they can do the back and forth aacm-style, they can do music...
For the die-hard fans
(pun intended): Miss Platnum.
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A matter of casting
Like in a movie, good casting is the key. If you have clear roles that border on stereotype and find the right faces to fill them with life, chances are you have a hit. For the first half of the concert, it was an absolute hit. Colin Stetson on bass sax did a very impressive strongman act grounding the trio, all bulging muscles and energy, laying down circularly breathed drones and wicked single...
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Second-lining the Six
Wildly enjoyable set from a duo called Donkey Monkey, which is made up of Eve Risser on piano and Yuko Oshima on drums, both completely unknown to me. Very nice bitonalities from the piano, not like you’d usually expect in that kind of context, no mock-twelve-tone aesthetic, but rather a hint of ragtime sublimations as tried out by serious French composers. Now if I’d want to launch...
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Aurora polaris
… Northern lights entered through a wormhole on stage and the big band rode out on a blissful finale …
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Non-combustible modified foam
Miles Davis has been invented for the Norwegians. No? Oh wait, trumpeter Palle Mikkelborg is actually Danish. This started out as if Strangers in the Night had been part of the Ascenseur pour l’Échafaud soundtrack, only with the hangman leaning on a synth (for which he should be hung). But also shades of early electric Miles played through non-combustible modified foam (I have that from...
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1970
Terje rypping it, he’s still at it. What I like most about this pic: it has aged so well. Remember, this is 1970 :-)
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Warming the taste buds
Damn. My opening gambit has been destroyed. I haven’t been called a ripper on this here blog. The good folks at Plush home base (Hi Kat and Matt!) have called me that everywhere else but here. The epithet was used in every piece of blurbage but here. I was depending on it. What do I do?
So I’ve shipped the family to the Balticum to be able to be in Moers. They’re lounging on the beach, I could...
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Moers improvisation from global talents
The 39th moers festival swings into action this weekend - celebrating the vitality and joie de vivre of contemporary improvisation from around the world. Watch concerts, interviews and behind the scenes musical anaylsis streamed live here at Plushmusic.tv.
This gem of a festival sources and catalyses real talent and risk taking - bringing together artists from different generations, continents...
Frankfurter Rundschau review of LOFT festival
Its been a little while since we filled these pages with insights from LOFT, brought to you by our trusty live blogger Lutz - so here’s a view from the outside. Ulrich Kurth wrote this piece for the Frankfurter Rundschau, here’s our translation.
Read the original German post here.
Inner Mogolia is not a real place but rather a vision, somewhat like the mythical Shambhala. The...
April 2010
28 posts
The Jeff Bridges thing
On the train back home from LOFT festival, dog-tired (did have to get up once I laid down, sort of a trampoline effect), I’m finally listening to Coptic Dub from the Embassadors, which Hayden (above) gave me at the last moment. The group are probably named for the fact that they do an embarrassing job as ambassadors for jazz. Or anything really. The record’s a smash, like Hayden’s previous...
Wildcard: Gratkowski, Xu, Kiedaisch
Here Fengxia would have to confront another extrovert (plus a set of percussion, which if provoked might break into severe noise any moment). What could possibly be the result. Outright mayhem? But yes! Detailed, triumphant mayhem! There’s really not many words one could fold around the fact, it was just a delight to witness.
It’s been a delight of the whole festival, anyway, to see the freedom...
Wildcard: Hayden Chisholm, Frank Gratkowski
Today’s wildcard improvisation definitely merits two posts. It began as a duo between Hayden and Frank. Now two visuals were immediately striking: while Hayden was bathed in an angelic halo of red curls but his alto looked sort of faded, Frank himself looked kind of grey while his alto is much too sparkling. See the pic. Frank’s sax is really too shiny for him to be taken seriously as a...
Set two: Voyage to the Inner Mongolia
When, to get into the mood for his inner Mongolia, and into the right voice of course, Hayden gargled a good swallow of 80 proof bison grass vodka, I had a feeling I could relate to this trip, whatever ensued. This was a much more roughshod ride than the previous set, again, only related through the vast ground it covered. And the profane fact that people on stage tended to break into vocals....
Set one: Approaching Sesfontein
Whoa. This was a duo set by Gareth Lubbe and Michael Kiedaisch, who had never improvised before together. In public, that is, they had met on the new music beat, tried out some things during down times, and Michael was the man who Gareth wanted to play duo with when he was asked for his favourite project to contribute to the festival.
Michael started out with one soft, one hard mallet in each...
Xu Fengxia has arrived and set up her equipment! Here she is trying out the room’s acoustics on her guzheng (not an instrument that I would be sure to know, quite honestly, but wikipedia backs me up). What you can’t see is that at the other end of the room Michael Kiedaisch is back behind his kit jamming along. Maybe that is part of what will happen on today’s third Wildcard session?
Approaching rehearsals
Right now there’s Michael Kiedaisch and Gareth Lubbe doing their rehearsal. The funny thing is, small world again, that I will have seen Michael behind a drum set in Stuttgart, where I grew up, haunting the jazz clubs when I was a kid and he not much older. Today he brings a vibraphone and a drum set enhanced by several metal pieces (see the ship-like forms on the kit in the background) done by a...
No morning music
Today’s morning music is no morning music at all. It makes me feel edgy. It makes me feel like I had several drinks too much the evening before…
I was actually listening far into the small hours to Marcus Schmickler and Hans-Martin Müller dissecting the music scene in Cologne from Stockhausen to the now. I’m sure I could spread incredible insights except for the fact that…well, see...
Wildcard: Gratkowski, Brendel, Pauß, Schröder
Now that was the wildest of the wildcards I’ve yet seen at the two LOFT festivals I’ve been to. Both in respect as to how spontaneous the group that actually hit the stage was formed, and the music itself.
Frank Gratkowski, once upon a time Hayden’s teacher, and widely recorded reed player, had been invited and brought his bass clarinet. Plus Adrian decided he hadn’t sufficiently hugged the...
Storm blown over
I’ve stayed in the tech’s room after all. See the two headphone heads of Jonas and Elmar providing the video live edit which should have been streamed. It’s all safely in the can.
Well, the concert really has become an 80s party. The unflinching exploration of all our repressed instincts. Wait, since you can’t hear the music, you’ll need some references. Think mid-era Weather Report....
Chamber Work rewind
The stream’s still broken, it’s ridiculous, I thought this was the 21st century…
So how to describe in a little more detail what just went down?
First there were the Kodaly pieces. The first of them required placing a silver hotel mute over the strings. This made for such a quiet sound that I didn’t dare take notes because the paper would rustle. More obvious than innocent little...
Set one: New Chamber Works
I have the exact programme for the first set now. It is
György Kurtág: 6 pieces from Signs, Games and Messages, an ongoing series of miniatures
Kaija Saariaho: Spins and Spells from 1996
both of these for cello solo and interpreted by Adrian Brendel. He just played the Saariaho for me in a backroom of the LOFT (see above) and it’s a fascinating mix of very dizzy moves and calm, almost eerie...
Oh, and here’s the composer confidently tooting his horn while everybody else is still desperately ogling the music.
Precious Storm soundcheck
Here’s Simon trying out the Fender Rhodes for tonights’ second set, with Hayden tinkering at the knobs of the amp. As always, it is hard to make predictions. I think it’s safe to say that Hayden will not walk the table. Simon is probably the most likely of the three to succumb to his baser instincts and move into some heavy riffing from what I hear in the background. John will funkily disrupt...
Morning music
So, it’s the first morning after. BJ Cole has kindly given me his latest record yesterday, Lush Life, a trio with Roger Beaujolais on vibraphone and Simon Thorpe on bass. I’m sitting backstage at the LOFT, enjoying a frugal breakfast and blasting the record over a bass-heavy boombox. Which I’m sure is the best way to listen to this, because this definitely is morning music. Sometimes the...
Wildcard: Gareth Lubbe and Simon Nabotov
Both musicians had not played as a duo before, but between a classical viola player who works in many improvisatory contexts and an improvising pianist with classical chops, common ground was quickly found. When things almost threatened to become too comfortable, Gareth broke into sudden bearsong. Well, I guess there was some sort of throatsinging involved, but really it sounded like bearsong,...
Set two: Odessa Blues Suite
Now that was great fun. Mad amount of ground covered during this suite. There probably is a mad amount of ground around Odessa. Also unbelievable emotional contrasts at work, we started somewhere near permafrost with Nils working the high range of his trombone, but the band also plain rocked out – the man who sat beside me laughed with delight.
The players worked like a cast of characters with...
The first piece like roundelay with each man taking over responsibilities in succession. BJ Cole doing string orchestra to Gareth’s slightly ruffled lark ascending, or letting rip to suggest a visit by Sun Ra. I’m not sure if I processed the text correctly, but it seems people in Kansas drink a lot of wine. The music tells me they get along very well. The second piece started with a drone and...
First set: To the Heart of Kansas
You can switch on the stream now, Hayden will definitely not croon during the first set - watch here - . He’ll instead be reading a self-penned text (dare we call it poetry? don’t ask me, I haven’t heard it yet) and accompany himself on the instrument most dear to the heart of Kansas (where he lives amongst a dozen other places): the microtonal steel drum. I have no idea what to expect, there was...
All ready to kick off at the LOFT
I thought I’d feel glamorous on the train blogging away on a usb stick, but I got no connection. Right now I cannot concentrate because here in the back room Gareth Lubbe is fiddling away on a Stroh violin. But that will be the beauty of my days here. Expect even less coherence.
I had a quick look in on the band practicing, here’s a pic. Not trying to give away too much, but in the Heart of...