Classical Music

[Music] Various Artists- Heresy Records: A Map Of The Kingdom Of Ireland

/ Rudy Carrera / Leave a comment

Though not as long in the tooth as INA-GRM nor as exotic as the scenes in places like Egypt or Iran, it seems that Ireland has developed a venerable electroacoustic music scene which has spanned over five decades.  This compilation, A Map of the Kingdom of Ireland, a compilation of Irish Electro-Acoustic music featuring works by Ireland’s most celebrated Electro-Acoustic artists, was released on March 2, 2018 by Dublin, Ireland-based Heresy Records, is quite a gem of not only electroacoustic music, but of pure, non-theoretical music of many stripes, including contemporary classical and even new wave/post-punk.

The comp starts off gently with a cut by Paul Morrin.  It is a bit like a boat taken off its moorings, and drifts along until about the two-minute mark, when the tempo changes to something a bit more lively and focused – one could even say it has a post-rock feel to it, reminding me a bit of the band éf.

Tóirse Ó Ríordáin comes up next with something that feels slightly like an early Penguin Café Orchestra piece if it were composed somewhere near the border of Brazil and Colombia.

It is Daniel Figgis’ piece, Timothy Cream’s Crown of Wines, which really gets into a more freeform composition, referencing avant-garde music and perhaps Krautrock. There is a lilting, marching quality to the composition which allows one to drift off into the ether while.

Even freakier are the two pieces turned in by Dublin mainstay Roger Doyle.  This is a bit away from the avant-garde – this feels more like a cleaner, more updated sound referencing Tangerine Dream.  As my old Kraut friends would say, “sehr Kosmisch…”

The fun surprise of the compilation for me were the two tracks included by Princess Tinymeat (a reference to actor Montgomery Clift’s… er… shortcomings in the boudoir, I’d imagine).  His (her?) back catalog is screaming for a re-release, as I haven’t come across this name since I was collecting cassettes in the late 1980s.

Finally, Spooky Ghost gets a mention for some of the most pleasant guitar work I’ve heard since Vini Reilly was in peak form with the Durutti Column in the early 80s.

There isn’t a duff track on the compilation.  If you find this collection enjoyable, you may want to also consider purchasing On The Nature Of Electricity & Acoustics, another remarkable compilation curated, this time, by Figgis.

Track Listing
1. Compass – Paul Morrin
2. Atop D’Seefin (Educution remix) – Tóirse Ó Ríordáin
3. Timothy Cream’s Crown of Wines – Daniel Figgis
4. Avant Garde Your Grille – Deep Burial
5. Little Train To Heaven – Richard G. Evans with Daniel Figgis
6. Eighties Rampwalk – Roger Doyle
7. Sleep Circus (remix) – Paddy Hunt vs. Charles
8. Richard Harris Blesses The Dawn Flotilla At Guilvinec – Cathal Coughlan with the Grand Necropolitan String Band
9. Finale from The Room In The Tower – Roger Doyle
10. handsinmyhead – GREETINGS
11. DriftDin – Vincent Doherty
12. Arcticus – Donald Teskey
13. Your Majesty – Princess Tinymeat
14. Stutter – Spooky Ghost
15. Unscan Ó Malley – Tóirse Ó Ríordáin
16. MegaMix – Princess Tinymeat
17. Wandering Compass – Paul Morrin

* The digital version of the album includes the following four tracks

18. Old Piano – Vincent Doherty
19. Reverse – SOM
20. Audacity – Deafector
21. Rampwalk – Roger Doyle / Olwen Fouéré

[Music] Here’s One I Prepared Earlier

/ Rudy Carrera / Leave a comment

Nice to see John Cage and his infamous 4’33” get its due in a proper article written about it.

Vinyl Connection's avatar

I

Find somewhere to sit, it doesn’t matter where. Imagine a musician entering the space and preparing to perform. Count to two hundred and seventy-three in beats as close to a second apart as you can manage.

Applaud as the performer exits the space.

You have just created a mental facsimile of the most famous work of American composer John Milton Cage (1912–1992). It is called 4’33” and is not, as is commonly assumed, a piece of silence but rather a period of time to notice the sounds, the music if you will, of your environment.

The piece is one of many explorations of expectations and context that Cage undertook during his career, a musical life rooted in the European tradition but moulded and influenced profoundly by Cage’s interest in Eastern philosophy, particularly Zen Buddhism.

It has been said that all behaviour is communication, which certainly includes creating music, one…

View original post 593 more words

[Music] Alapastel – Hidden for the Eyes

/ Rudy Carrera / Leave a comment

I’ve been spending a lot of time listening to releases by James Murray’s beautifully-curated label Slowcraft Records.  This one by Alapastel, at least given the two tracks available currently (the whole album will be released on March 9), seems to be the gem of the collection so far.

Lukáš Bulko (the aforementioned Alapastel) is a composer out of Slovakia, where a lot of amazing independent music is coming out of these days.  He manages to patch together a mesmerizing blend of contemporary classical music, a touch of musique concrète, and maybe a speck of post-rock in a way not dissimilar to Ólafur Arnalds. I’m very much looking forward to following which direction Lukáš will go in the future.

For a more in-depth review, I recommend visiting Dan’s review over at Fluid Radio.

[Music] Zinovia Arvanitidi – Ivory

/ Rudy Carrera / 1 Comment

Greek pianist and composer Zinovia Arvanitidi has a new disc coming out, and if the one track she and record company Kitchen Label shared is any indication, it will be a spectacular release. From her Bandcamp site:

“There is a life and there is a death, and there are beauty and melancholy between.”

Born in Athens, Greek composer Zinovia Arvanitidi is most widely remembered as one half of the duo Pill-Oh in Vanishing Mirror as well as her debut solo The Gift of Affliction. Zinovia returns with her first solo piano album titled Ivory, and like its precursors, further highlights her mastery in crafting piano ambiances of austere beauty and melancholia, led by mesmerizing melodies and evolving cinematic textures.

Fully self-produced, the now France-based composer navigates through her own time-memory universe with Debussy-like impressionistic daubs, but sublimely she draws the listener into a strangely familiar landscape where the past confronts the present – it is perhaps a dimension that exists within all of us. As the chapters unfold, memories are untangled as darkness shifts into light. The minimalistic nature of the early piano pieces are then transformed, lush and ornate with orchestral strings, subtle electronic atmospheres, field recordings and airy whispers.

An omnipresent sense of duality lingers throughout the album, as with the ivory and ebony colours of piano keys, or the birth and decay of seasons. This is a work where the artist has grasped the essence of the quote by Albert Camus: “There is a life and there is a death, and there are beauty and melancholy between”. The aural journey heightens, then subsides with a newfound serenity in closing, engaging the listener to invoke their own introspections on acceptance and healing.

Rooted in film and television (and represented by film composer agency Oticons among the names of Shigeru Umebayashi and Jan A.P Kaczmarek), Zinovia’s well-versed background in cinematic scoring manifests in her dexterity at veiling intricacies within each track that only unveil themselves with each subsequent listen. As a fully expanded realisation of Zinovia’s artistic voice, Ivory will resonate with fans who love Pill-Oh, and appeal to those familiar with Ryuichi Sakamoto and Dustin O’Halloran.

French photographer Aëla Labbé’s enigmatic cover art photography once again unifies with Zinovia’s soundscapes since her work for Vanishing Mirror.

Zinovia Arvanitidi releases Ivory on 29 March 2018 on Piano Day via KITCHEN. LABEL worldwide. Available on 180g white vinyl LP, CD and DL.

March 29th can’t come fast enough for me.

[Music] A.M Ferrari Fradejas – Requiem No. 2

/ Rudy Carrera / Leave a comment

We’re treated to the year’s first Bandcamp surprise, thanks to our beloved friend A.M Ferrari Fradejas, currently based in Barcelona, Spain.

Despite its 13-minute length, the composition packs a lot of time changes, churning guitars, an eerie choral section reminding one of a solstice ritual melded with her trademark progressive/improvisational sound. I hope that either a full album is forthcoming soon, or that works in this style are further expanded upon.

Blissful!

[Music] Z’ev – Live in Iceland

/ Rudy Carrera / Leave a comment

We lost another legend today.

Percussionist Stefan Weisser, known to his fans and colleagues as Z’ev, passed on today at the age of 66. He left a body of work so important in experimental music that I expect tributes to pour out for days (including this one from our pals in Lithuania, Radikaliai!).

This free download is a release Z’ev did in Iceland in 2004. It gives a nice taste of what he could do with percussion.