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 ostinato. The whole thing seems so much extended techniques objectified that it comes as a shock, ten minutes into the concert, that one can actually play the thing. You know, it’s a musical instrument.

This was a duo with Jon Rose in the protestant church here. Very nice atmosphere, but if you now expect to read that they explored the resonances, ‘tis not so. They played a lot. Especially Rose (unsurprisingly, for those of you who know him) was all over the place. The centerpiece fittingly was a Rose solo and had him in his most unforgiving Teufelsgeiger mode.

Since they both went through their catalog of moves so quickly (Angeli threw crocodile clips all over the place), by the third track rote repetition had set in. Until the tantalising outro which was just toneless scraping noises coming and going in overlapping cycles and by far the best moment of the concert.

There were lots of notes harmed in the making of this music.