{"title":"Special offer #2","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eBuy previous CDs by Jurg Frey, Klaus Lang and Kristofer Svensson at sale prices:  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003e£6 for single discs, £10 for double albums\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003eOffer open until May 4th\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"grizzana-and-other-pieces-2009-2014-jurg-frey","title":"Jürg Frey","description":"\u003cdiv id=\"txt_1227\"\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: start;\" id=\"txt_1228\"\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eDisc One\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e1.\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003ePetit fragment de paysage\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e(2009)          5:08\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e   version for clarinet \u0026amp; cello\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e2.\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFragile Balance\u003c\/strong\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e(2014)                           13:42\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e3.\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003eOmbres exactes sans dûret\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eé\u003c\/strong\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C20\"\u003e(2009)       9:41\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e4.\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eA Memory of Perfection\u003c\/strong\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e(2010)              9:30\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e5.\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eExtended Circular Music No.8\u003c\/strong\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e(2014)   16:46\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e6-12.  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eGrizzana\u003c\/strong\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e(2014)                                 18:44\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e13.  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePetit fragment de paysage\u003c\/strong\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e(2009)        5:02\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e      version for organ and piano\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eDisc Two\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e1.\u003cspan\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePetit fragment de paysage\u003c\/strong\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e(2009)              5:13\u003cspan\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e     version for violin and viola\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e2.\u003cspan\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eLieues d’ombres\u003c\/strong\u003e   \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e(2009)                             14:53\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e3.\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eTendre enchaînement des valeurs\u003c\/strong\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e(2009)    8:40\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e4.\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFerne Farben\u003c\/strong\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e(2013)                                     12:16\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e5.\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eArea of Three\u003c\/strong\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e(2013)                                    30:52\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e6.\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePetit fragment de paysage \u003c\/strong\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e(2009)                4:58\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e    version for flute and viola\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C15\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eEnsemble Grizzana:\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C15\"\u003eJürg Frey (clarinet)\u003cbr\u003eMira Benjamin (violin)\u003cbr\u003eRichard Craig (flute)\u003cbr\u003eEmma Richards (viola)\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C15\"\u003e                               \u003cbr\u003ePhilip Thomas (piano)  \u003cbr\u003eSeth Woods (cello) \u003cbr\u003eRyoko Akama (electronics)\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C15\"\u003e\u003cimg style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; float: none;\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/Jurg_Frey_by_Joachim_Eckl_8c360335-8d12-4156-8c61-564ad48cbd32_480x480.jpg?v=1751732294\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv id=\"txt_383\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003cdiv id=\"txt_384\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: start;\" id=\"txt_1226\"\u003e\n\u003ch2 class=\"Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C6\"\u003eJürg Frey interviewed by Brian Olewnick\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cem\u003eBO: I thought I'd begin by simply asking about your background - I know almost nothing! You and I are about the same age (I think you have me beaten by a year), so I was wondering if you could describe your path as a young man that ultimately brought you to creating in this area of music - what you were listening to when growing up, to be sure, but also other things that turned out to have a strong influence on your basic outlook, aesthetic or otherwise\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eJF: Yes, we are almost the same age, which allows me to touch pretty quickly on some events, phenomena and music which perhaps we both experienced in a similar way. My main interest as a 17 year-old teenager was in art. Woodstock 1969 was something I “heard about”, one of my favorite LPs was Deep Purple’s\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eConcerto for Group and Orchestra\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e.  Classical music was part of this too, but likewise not very profoundly. I remember one thing from school at the time: I could not make a distinction between Mozart and Vivaldi by ear!  But I knew who George Brecht was (\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eHappening \u0026amp; Fluxus\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003ewas my first art work catalogue in 1970) and free jazz was a model for my own playing on the saxophone. I knew the paintings of Joseph Beuys as well as some of Philip Guston’s paintings. I knew Richard Long’s work from catalogues, as well as the work of Dan Flavin and Carl Andre. I don’t remember any distinction in terms of styles. I was fascinated by Minimal Art and Conceptual Art. I practiced Messiaen’s\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eQuatuor pour la fin du temps\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003eon clarinet; it was too difficult at the time, but nevertheless was a defining experience. When I was 19 I wrote a first piece for two pianos, a graphic notation, and I remember experiments in writing music in charts and columns. It was too complicated to play, you couldn’t find your way through the tables - a mixture of styles and genres - and I had to decide if I was to go more into art or into music. My focus went to classical music and I caught up on my deficits and more, I discovered I had a feeling for harmony, form and all the topics of classical music.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eNevertheless, my training followed two different lines: one was the regular training in a music conservatory to become a classical clarinet player, the other is all the rest, which happened at the time more or less outside of the institutions. Let me speak now about my very first composition. Significantly, it’s difficult to say if this is a piece of music or a piece of art.  The title is\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eStück 1975 (for private or public performance)\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003eand it consists of 41 sheets of very different quality in terms of size, material, texts, graphics et al. No staves and no pitches, no instrumentation, no duration, no rules for contexts, but references to relationships with styles, fonts, paper qualities. The score exists as two unique pieces: one is in the library at Northwestern University, the other is in my archive. This piece was like a summary of influences and interests from that time, and also a starting point in making steps toward music in the narrow sense.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eAnd this leads me to the other early piece I want to talk about:\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eLachen und Lächeln\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e(1978) for soprano, violin, clarinet, horn and piano, on a text by the Swiss poet Robert Walser. I didn’t have a clear awareness when I started writing the piece, but had a strong feeling when I had finished it that yes, composition was something for me to go on with.  Looking back on this piece today, I recognise characteristics, already present in the piece, which are important for my later work. It happened somehow in this early piece, and I remember the reason that I wrote this kind of piece was not as an exercise in compositional technique or for aesthetic considerations, but because I wanted to write something I liked to listen to. (And of course, I felt that with this music I would be in opposition to normal contemporary music; this was important too!). The piece has a duration of 18 minutes, consists of 8 pieces, No 1-3 are for soprano and small ensemble, followed by No 4-8, which are all piano pieces. The sounds are mostly consonant (unisons, thirds, sixths, octaves). After a short beginning with the whole ensemble, the lengthy remainder of the work is solo piano music; the audience and the other musicians on stage become listeners and the pianist goes on his path alone.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003eBO: Some reservations about Wandelweiser music (obviously, this is a gross generalization) have to do with what you might call \"easy answers\", having a worldview, as expressed in the music, that's overly contemplative or dwelling on aspects of beauty as opposed to dealing with the harsh realities of the world. (Personally, I don't see it as an either\/or situation, but I'm sure this general criticism surfaces fairly often). So, I guess my question would be: When you're thinking about a piece or while you're composing it, do you consider extra-musical aspects (for example, things occurring in the political world and how the music relates to it or is shaped by it) or do you think of the music as self-contained, jewel-like if you will, wanting it to be appreciated in isolation? Or both - Morandi's art, which we'll get to a bit later, seems to cover both worlds, the latter (social) implicitly. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eJF: Here many different things come together, and the danger is that they are simplified too much. I will try to clarify: “\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003edo you consider extra-musical aspects (for example, things occurring in the political world and how the music relates to it or is shaped by it)…”  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eIf this means that a composer should react in his work to an earthquake in Nepal or boat people in the Mediterranean, then no. Mostly this would be a clumsy way to attract attention. Neither art nor political processes should be limited in this way.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eWith respect to general political music, I can't remember any so-called political music making an impact on my life. For instance, Christian Wolff's music: I agree with him in many aspects of his political stance, but his music did not sharpen my mind in this respect. But his work as a composer is inspiring to me, how he works with ensembles, notation, scores, relationships, - and if this can be seen as a ‘political’ aspect in his music, I'm fine to call it political. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eIn my work, I consider each note as an individual, I respect each note as a sound personality. This may also be one of the reasons why I continue to compose by hand: I can give my attention to every note. I take responsibility for the note, and I also want that every note itself feels good and right in its place and in the context. And with this work ethic follows a similar attitude towards the musicians: I respect each musician as a personality, I count on their skills, their musicianship, and I hope to write music for them that is rewarding, and for which it’s worth taking responsibility. In this way I am seeking personal and social transformations.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eI also don't think that a music that is “\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003edealing with the harsh realities of the world” \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003ehas more to do with life than one that is “\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003econtemplative or dwelling on aspects of beauty.”\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003eAnd \"easy answers\" are possible with any kind of material: a major chord or 12-tone cluster or a field recording or a noisy bang. Or just a simple pitch. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBut there is a lot of potential in the term \"easiness\", and of course it’s an important issue: easiness is wonderful, why make things more complicated than necessary? But on the other hand, things are complex, and silly simplification is not easiness but stupidity. But I do not resist an elegant solution.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003e“Do you think of the music as self-contained, jewel-like if you will, wanting it to be appreciated in isolation?” \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eNo. Again I feel it as a limitation to think of my music in a certain context. But on the other hand, my music is something to listen to. It works well when the listener focuses.  My music is for the ears and for the eardrum. The eardrum is a gateway to the body, the mind and the soul, and I respect the eardrum as a very sensitive thing. (And for other characteristics than just the sound itself - form, duration and other things more connected to mind and feelings - my music can be edged and rough). \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003e“Is there an overarching idea or \"goal\" with a given piece, somewhere you are looking to reach, some idea you're looking to express, or do you let the notes determine what is reached or constructed?”\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eI understand art in general, and my music too, as an intensification of life. It makes existence more intense, makes the individual being richer and the understanding of what life could be, more colourful.  In my music, it can be done by silence and stillness, by precisely selected pitches, by sensations of shape and transitions, by hesitation or movement....\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003eBO: Maybe we can begin to talk about the recording, Grizzana, at the same time being able to go back to some of these issues. First, having used his hometown as the title of the collection, would you like to talk about Morandi and his meaning for you?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003eSecond, I'm curious if the pieces here were intended as a group, related in a general or specific way. One of the first things that came to mind after having recently listened (frequently) to your album on the Musiques Suisses label was how relatively astringent these works are. Perhaps only because of knowledge about the Morandi connection, I find myself \"tracing\" Morandi-like still lifes with those sandy string lines, for instance, sketching the shapes in, as it were, with the sounds, a very enjoyable preoccupation! I think you describe this music as \"drier\" or \"less lush\"; astrigency, technically, has to do with something that makes your lips pucker, like lemon! Maybe \"chalky\" (which might also lead to Morandi....)\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eJF: The work of Morandi has been part of my own work for many years, and for a long time I was looking for a possibility to express my respect to the painter.  When Simon Reynell asked me for the details of a programme for this CD, I saw the opportunity to write a new piece to concretise my admiration for Morandi.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eMorandi’s painting is figurative painting, but at the same time, he works with aspects of abstract painting. So you can see him also as an abstract painter who works with objects. To make a link to music (and sorry, I have to simplify it now, but in the daily process of my work, this reflection develops the whole richness of complexity), I can understand a melody as like a figurative part of a painting. Similarly to how you can remember melody as a “thing“, as a motif in music, you can see on the canvas a bottle, a house (and some painters speak about “working on the motif”). So on the other hand, in music the sound (just the sound) can be seen as an equivalent to abstract colour.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eWith this image in the background, you can listen to many of my pieces from the past.  Sometimes it goes more to the abstract side, sometimes more to the figurative, but in general it takes a clear position between the two.  It happened unconsciously in the earlier pieces, and later I discovered this image of abstract \/ figurative to find words to speak about the music. And the piece \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eGrizzana\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e maybe uses this more consciously in the focus of the composition.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eBut let me finish these reflections on Morandi with a quote. Sean Scully wrote in his essay about Giorgio Morandi: “His brushstroke is in complete philosophical agreement with the subject, the scale and the colour of his painting. It is expressive, though it is modest, and not so expressionistic as to disturb the sense of meditative silence that inhabits all his works.”\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eThe pieces on the\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eGrizzana\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003ealbum are not connected as one complete group (except they were all composed in the last few years and therefore they often revolve around similar content and compositional questions), but some of them are connected and composed in parts and subgroups.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eSome of the pieces have more than just a musical background, and two personalities are important in this context: one is Morandi, the other is the Swiss poet Gustave Roud (for the pieces with French titles). Both artists have similar biographies. Morandi lived all his life in Bologna (except when he visited his summer house in Grizzana), Gustave Roud’s life was centred on the small landscape around the village of Carrouge, north of Lake Geneva. And in their work, both concentrate on a few topics to discover essential dimensions of human life. Morandi’s work focuses on still lifes with bottles, and landscapes, which are also important for me. Gustave Roud recognised the existential dimensions in the daily life of his friends, in the finest nuances of the weather and changes of the atmosphere of the landscape, and he made these perceptionsthe basis of his literary work.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eThe other works on the CD are composed for different occasions: A \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eMemory of Perfection\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e was a suggestion of violinist Erik Carlson (the title is a quote of Agnes Martin and the piece refers to my 2nd string quartet).\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eArea of Three\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e and \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eFerne Farben\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e were first performed during \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eWandelweiser\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e weeks in Neufelden (Austria), and \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eFragile Balance\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e was written for Nomi Epstein and the ensemble a.pe.ri.od.ic.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eI agree with you about the characterisation of the music as “drier“. Here the music is less lush compared to the Musiques Suisses recordings.  What you call \"astringency\" is clearly audible in the aspect of canons and counterpoint in several pieces. Sometimes, as in\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eLieues d'ombres,\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003eit refers to all the rigour of canon writing, but mostly it opens onto a more vague idea of canon and counterpoint. This is a paradox, because the canon is one of the most severe forms of composition. But I deal with this paradox, because I’m seeking a certain kind of expression.  It happens during the performance, when the musicians are balancing between the given score and the notion\/idea of the playing of the other musicians.  The atmosphere, the base colour and the shape are similar in every performance, but the details are different. Sensitive reactions to different tempi and unpredictable cues from other musicians create this vague path between risk and surprise and keep it in a \"fragile balance\".\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003e“Maybe \"chalky\" (kreidig) (which might also lead to Morandi....)”\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eI like this remark. I never thought about \"chalky\" when I wrote\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eGrizzana\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e, though of course I had Morandi's work as a whole present in my mind. It is a good example of how a strong flow in the background can have an impact on a work. I think the colours in the piece are pretty near to Morandi's chalky blue, purples, brown and yellow shades.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003eBO: You mentioned canons. Why have canons become prominent in much of your recent work?  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003eAnd would you elaborate a bit more on Gustave Roud and his meaning for you? My French isn't nearly good enough to do justice to the originals but in the few English translations I've found, I can certainly see some affinity with regard to his, as one writer put it, \"romantic sublimity and classical restraint\".\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eJF: I wrote my first canons in 2002 and 2003. Before, I had resisted the idea of using canons and had even rejected any connection of my music with canons. My impression about my music at that time was: I have to touch every sound individually and to put it in its place in the timeflow. And in this context the canon was just an automatic mechanism, outside my interests. The first canon I wrote is\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eGlafsered\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e. The title refers to the name of a small village in Sweden, the residence of Björn Nilsson, and this curator's strong interests in canons and counterpoint gave me the impetus. My first canons are strong scholastic works with respect to the technique of composition. But the material and the sounds are flat, bland and non-specific. You cannot hear a canon structure (though you can see it in the score). Or, as in\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eUnhörbare Zeit(1)\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e, most of the music is silence with very few sounds; so to speak, silences in a canon. Later I opened up this scholastic approach to a more flexible one. And I told myself, a canon is simple: it's the same or a similar thing, but it happens later, the same activity, and later again, the same and later again.  And when I walked through the streets, I saw canon structures everywhere in daily life - it's not just a musical phenomenon. And I started to research the possibilities between openness and strict writing. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThis gave me the opportunity to write pieces like \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003ecanones incerti\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e, \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eVague Canons\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e, \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eCircular Music\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e, and many others whose titles are not directly related to the canon. Most of them are with sounds and music, but a piece like this is also part of my interest in canons:\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e11:30 Eat a fruit\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e12:17 Say a word clearly and quietly\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e12:43 Read silently one page in a book unknown to you\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e14:21 Play or hum a scale of six tones\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e14:24 Think of someone you'd like to kiss\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e14:35 Take a picture with your camera\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e15:20 A long flat noise, very quiet\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eThis is the first voice of a time and activity structure during a day; a second and a third voice start each 10 minutes later.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI have recently written some very strict canons, but I am more interested in insecure canons and counterpoint structures. I see arising a precise musical expression of tenderness, clarity, risk and a groping when musicians act in an open canon structure. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd another aspect of the canon I’ve begun to understand: once I have found the right notes, sounds and pauses, I can let the music go on by itself, I don't need to touch them again, I don't have to think about new energies, other directions, I can just listen and it goes on by itself, lovely.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eAs to Gustave Roud: when I look at my artistic interests as a wide panorama, then at first the Canons and Gustave Roud are far away from each other. A canon is a technique, a structure and \"some kind of a music\" is already in the background, and I try to make this situation useful for my work. Gustave Roud seems to be the opposite: it's pure sensation, emotion, and my desire is to find a structure, the sounds and a score for all these feelings. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eGustave Roud's oeuvre is deeply connected with his living in Carrouge and his walks around a few villages in the neighbourhood of the \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eHaut-Jorat\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e. I consider his work as a kind of \"field recording\" at a clearly defined place, during a long period of more than 50 years, not with a microphone, but with his sketchbook, and not just for sounds, but also for colours, shades, subtle changes of the fields, trees, flowers, scenes, and details of working or resting farmers, the seasons, and his own thoughts and feelings. And similarly to the way in which a microphone takes in every sound, Gustave Roud reacted to the finest and most delicate impressions in the environment and in his feelings. When he made his walks (and I imagine slow walks, with long stops and time just looking at the landscape), he always had his sketchbook with him to write down his observations and thoughts. These sketchbooks are the basis of his work. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eRoud’s oeuvre has accompanied me for nearly ten years.  This coming-together is maybe more in the background, because on the surface his work also speaks about experiences of just living in the rural countryside. “Romantic sublimity and classical restraint\" is for sure part of his work, but inside, in the nucleus, I see a relationship to what I’m doing, outside of a simple assignment to a genre. His texts remain a strong inspiration for me and give me a strong insight into the depth of how to make art. Similar to my work, where I try to translate feelings, notions and intuitions into signs (these are the black and white dots and lines on the five line stave) to create at the end a score, so Roud tries to translate his first unnamable observations into words and sentences to achieve at the end a poetic work. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd another thing, maybe more in parenthesis: to read the texts by Gustave Roud is a pleasure for me, precisely because my French is not fluent. It slows down the reading and makes it similar to his walking in the landscape, standing idle, listening, thoughts, walking again....\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003eBO: I didn't know Roud's work at all but, searching around, I see at least one reason why: very little has been translated into English as near as I can determine (and my French is, I'm sure, far worse than yours). I did locate one passage \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"http:\/\/calquezine.blogspot.fr\/2009\/10\/prairies-powers-by-gustave-roud.html\" target=\"_blank\"\u003ehere.\u003c\/a\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003eI've no idea about the quality of translation, of course, but between this and your description, I can get at least a glimmer of the connection with your music and, sitting here now listening, find myself hearing the work in a slightly different and very rewarding light. It's always fascinating to me how extra-musical knowledge can enhance one's experience of music, either in the moment or even retrospectively. I've been listening through your set with that \"slowly walking around\" frame of mind, sometimes imagining catching a glimpse of a Morandi through a window--very rewarding, very special. \"Lieues d’ombres\" works especially beautifully, for me, this way, both the observational and canonic aspects.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eJF: Thanks for this remark about the connection between me and Roud and your experience when you listened again to the pieces with the background of the Roud text. Actually, this text, which is part of\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eAir de la solitude, is one of my initial inspirations for my compositions with Roud, and Petit fragment de paysage isa quote from this text, Pouvoir d'un prairie:\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003e\"A power is still more mysterious in the case of an isolated fragment embedded in the larger landscape...\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003e(Pouvoir plus mistérieux encore s'il s'agit d'un petit fragment de paysage qui s'isole à l'interieur de grand...\")\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cimg style=\"float: none;\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/Ju-rg_Frey_FOTO_3_zvg_ca7bb62e-644f-4caa-a30a-fff6e587a2bc_480x480.jpg?v=1751733481\"\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv id=\"txt_1226\"\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eReviews\u003c\/strong\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e“Sheffield label Another Timbre is enjoying a bumper 2015, with John Tilbury and Philip Thomas’s marvellous double set of Morton Feldman’s piano works followed by a succession of standout releases from Frank Denyer, Common Objects, Magnus Granberg and James Saunders. The momentum is maintained with this substantial overview of the recent work of Jürg Frey, a Swiss composer who has a long and prolific association with the Wandelweiser imprint and collective.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eAny typecast notions of spartan silence and schematic conceptualism are immediately dashed by ‘Grizzana and Other Pieces’, whose beguiling series of compositions are predicated to a surprising degree on conventional tonality, follow a discernible linear compositional logic, and happily deploy simple intervals and unadorned harmonic constructs to explore transparent contrasts in pitch and textural relationships. All ten may be Wandelweiser-like in their self-imposed limitations – most obviously a slowness of pacing and clear structural restraints – yet each is in different ways intensely sensuous, as well as preternaturally alert to the acoustic potential of spatial and dimensional divergences.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003ePerformed sensitively by Ensemble Grizzana, the album is an epic study of fragile balances, to borrow one of the set’s titles. Even its most complex and multi-layered works – ‘Extended Circular Music No.8’ for septet and the seven part title track for sextet, both from 2014 – sound perilously collapsible and feather-light, assembling string and wind-drones and piano detailing into melodic convergences and shimmeringly dense drone harmonics.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e‘A Memory of Perfection’ for solo violin from 2010 focuses on more stridulent textures, and other pieces examine degrees of fragmentation. ‘Lieues d’ombres’ for solo piano is a pointillistic arrangement of limpid chords, whose shifts in rhythmic patterns and mutating melodic linkages subtly though persistently threaten disintegration. The 31 minute ‘Area of Three’  for clarinet, piano and cello, falls apart before reconfiguring, its middle passage a flow of abstracted gestures separated by bouts of silence.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eHarmony has the final say, however. Both discs are bookended by readings of ‘Petit fragment de paysage’ for duo, each by a different instrumental configuration. Simple in form, yet meticulously focused and detailed, its sustained chords and drones overlap in simple yet powerful, almost profound melodic confluences and counterpoints, in the process speaking eloquently to the virtues of restraint and engagement with tradition.”    \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C22\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eNick Cain\u003c\/strong\u003e, The Wire\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e“Years ago I made the passing remark that if Morton Feldman’s music can be compared to Rothko (as it often is) then Howard Skempton’s can be compared to Morandi. The use of melody and conventional harmonic patterns creates a beguiling sensation of familiarity. That initial impression is deceptive, precisely in that it doesn’t try to deceive: representation in one and functional harmony in the other are left exposed, revealed as artifice – yet they still convey their effect (or affect).\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eLate last year I heard Jürg Frey and a small ensemble play a concert of his recent music. At the time I wrote that:\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eSome of Frey’s music that I’ve heard seems, to some extent, a provocation in its refusal to yield to an implied, wider palette of sounds. (This is particularly after hearing R. Andrew Lee play Frey’s piano music.) On this occasion, there were also some surprisingly rich sounds, with an almost playful (on Frey’s terms) exploration of harmonies and instrument combinations.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eThe album of Frey’s music that was recorded around the same time as that concert has now been released by Another Timbre as a double CD, titled Grizzana and other pieces 2009-2014. After hearing the concert I said that, “It will be interesting to hear the music apart from the theatre of performance.” It sounds even more tender and yielding than I expected. Is Frey mellowing with age, or am I just getting acclimatised?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eI listened again to Lee’s excellent first CD of Frey’s piano music. There’s a striking contrast between those earlier works and the newer pieces on Grizzana. There’s that notorious passage in Klavierstück II where the same perfect fourth is repeated 468 times. When repetitions appear in the newer music they provide a sense of continuity, not of stasis or impasse. The music alters the listener’s perception of the world through its complex sensory effect more than through any aesthetic dialectic. (Morton Feldman distinguished his own music from John Cage’s by highlighting the didactic tendency in Cage: “Most music is metaphor… I am not metaphor. Parable, maybe. Cage is sermon.”)\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eI’m reading that interview with Frey about the new CD and – what do you know? – he’s talking about Morandi:\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e“Morandi’s painting is figurative painting, but at the same time, he works with aspects of abstract painting. So you can see him also as an abstract painter who works with objects. To make a link to music (and sorry, I have to simplify it now, but in the daily process of my work, this reflection develops the whole richness of complexity), I can understand a melody as like a figurative part of a painting. Similarly to how you can remember melody as a “thing“, as a motif in music, you can see on the canvas a bottle, a house (and some painters speak about “working on the motif”). So on the other hand, in music the sound (just the sound) can be seen as an equivalent to abstract colour.”\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eI could have just read further and quoted that instead of typing all the above.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eFrey’s recent music is imbued with a quiet sophistication – the sort that doesn’t need to display its radical nature, its erudition. Where it was once necessary to make statements (like in the six-hour, almost inaudible electroacoustic collage Weites Land, Tiefe Zeit) it is now possible for these values to be affirmed as a given. The piece Ferne Farben, for example, uses field recordings in a way that may not even be noticed on casual listening, giving additional life, space and colour to the otherwise very slow and quiet playing of the acoustic instruments. Or perhaps, listening to it yet again, it’s the other way around.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003eAs might be expected, the performances by Frey himself and his “personal army” are beautifully clear and evocative. Aspects of this album recall last year’s double CD of Laurence Crane’s music, released on the same label: a sustained mood of ambiguous detail, unbroken surfaces over hidden depths. Frey’s music here, however, creates a strange double image in which each sound feels tentative yet inarguable, like a delicate organism. In the trio Area of Three, sustained sounds are inflected with the quietest, briefest notes that pass almost like accidents, silences pass like clouds. Appropriately, another of the pieces is titled Fragile Balance.”        \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C22\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eBen Harper\u003c\/strong\u003e on Boring Like a Drill\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Another Timbre","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51401247850810,"sku":"at86x2","price":17.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/at85x2Freygrizzana.jpg?v=1749136325"},{"product_id":"jurg-frey-collection-gustave-round","title":"Jürg Frey","description":"\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003eDisc One:\u003cbr\u003e1  \u003cstrong\u003ePaysage pour Gustave Roud  \u003c\/strong\u003e(2007 \/ 2008)    14:25\u003cbr\u003eStefan Thut, cello     \u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003eJ\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003eü\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003erg Frey, clarinet     Dante Boon, piano\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e2  \u003cstrong\u003eHaut Jurat  \u003c\/strong\u003e(2009)      7:51\u003cbr\u003eAndrew McIntosh, violin    \u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003eJ\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003eü\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003erg Frey, clarinet     Dante Boon, piano\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e3  \u003cstrong\u003eLa p\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cstrong\u003er\u003cspan style=\"mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;\"\u003eé\u003c\/span\u003esence, les silences    \u003c\/strong\u003e(2013\/2016)    41:07\u003cbr\u003eDante Boon, piano\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003eDisc Two:\u003cbr\u003e1  \u003cstrong\u003eFarblose Wolken, \u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003eGl\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003eü\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003eck, Wind    \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003e(2009 \/ 2011)    48:10\u003cbr\u003eRegula Konrad, soprano    Stephen Altoft, trumpet    \u003cbr\u003eStefan Thut, cello    Lee Ferguson, percussion\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003e2  \u003cstrong\u003eOmbre si fragile     \u003c\/strong\u003e(2007 \/ 2008 \/ 2010)     15:09\u003cbr\u003eAndrew McIntosh, violin     Stefan Thut, cello     Dante Boon, piano\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cimg style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; float: none;\" alt=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/Jurg_Frey_by_Joachim_Eckl_480x480.jpg?v=1751658039\"\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\n\u003ch2 class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\n\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C6\"\u003eInterview with J\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C15\"\u003eü\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C6\"\u003erg Frey\u003c\/span\u003e\n\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C16\"\u003eWho was Gustave Roud, and why are you so interested in his work?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003eThe poet Gustave Roud lived in the French speaking part of Switzerland from 1897 until 1976. After his studies in literature at the University of Lausanne, he realised that he didn’t want to continue the family tradition of working as a farmer.  Nonetheless he lived throughout his life, together with his sister, in his parents’ farmhouse in Carrouge in the countryside north of Lake Geneva.  His oeuvre is relatively small, his Collected Works comprising just three volumes.  However, his enormous correspondence, his diary, and his critical writings are a testimony to his prolific consideration of literature and the arts. And in recent years his work as a photographer has also become recognised.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003eI first encountered Roud’s work more than 10 years ago, and the impact of his work on my music has been profound. I feel a close relationship to a poet whose mode of operation and sensitivity make a precise resonance in me. It’s a unique poetry that speaks from beginning to end of searching for the essence. I would like to compare his mode of work with that of a painter. Every day he went out, not with an easel, but with his notebook, and he wandered through the landscape as a flaneur, observer, writer, laying the foundations of his work with his notes. For me his work constitutes a kind of ‘field recording’, not with a microphone and sounds, but with his soul and body, recording his environment in the broadest sense. He perceived existential dimensions in the finest nuances of the weather, the landscape and its inhabitants, and made it the basis of his work.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C16\"\u003eAll the works on the album relate to Roud’s work, but only one of them actually quotes from his texts. Do you nonetheless feel that the music is shaped by Roud’s work in some way?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003eWhen I look at the pieces on the album, then I can easily analyse how Roud’s work has left traces in the music. But it’s important to point out that it’s never a matter of taking a quote or an idea from Roud at the beginning and then writing the piece according to this. It’s a much deeper connection. I think my process of working is similar to Roud’s process of working: roaming with my sketchbook, taking a movement here, adding some notes there, following an impression, writing a little melody or a rhythmic constellation, deepening a feeling, extending a pitch, waiting and letting it happen, and over a month the possibility of a piece occurs. And then it becomes connected with a picture, a detail, or a sensation that I have encountered in Roud’s work.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eOmbre si fragile\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003eis a piece where I felt during the composition that it would become as fragile as a shadow; it’s not just a piece about light and shade, but even more about fragility.\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eHaut Jorat\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003eis the name of the countryside where Roud lived. The six pieces are like six photographs: sensations of air, light and landscape.\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eLa presence, les silences\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003ereflects more a feeling of being alive; standing, walking, breathing, experiencing: I am here.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003eRoud’s landscape is not a wilderness, it’s a landscape designed and machined by the daily labour of farmers and by nature. And that is why\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003ePaysage pour Gustave Roud\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003eis also a piece about form, durations, heavy or light materials, colours.\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eFarblose Wolken, Glück, Wind\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003emay be heard as a piece with a portrait of Gustave Roud and his internal and external landscape.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C16\"\u003eThe start of the quotation from Roud that you use in ‘Farblose Wolken, Glück, Wind’ reads “Quiet joy of being alone with my thoughts my sleep my dreams…” That seems as good a summary of the mood of your music in general as I can think of. Do you think of your music as trying to express a particular mood, or is that a misleading way of thinking about your work?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003eWhen I write music, I don’t try to express a particular mood. I don’t have to worry about that because it’s inevitable that the piece will express\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003ea mood. I have more the feeling that my thoughts and sensations are moving within the score, and I have to take care not to disturb this process. At the same time, this process is strongly under the influence of my actions, of my dealing with the material and my decisions. And in the case of the pieces with Gustave Roud, this work takes place within a triangle of the poet, the score, and myself.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003eWhen I say that a mood is inevitably expressed, it doesn’t mean that it happens inevitably, easily and by itself. Mostly it happens in an unclear way, destroyed or impaired because of uncertainties in the working process. I think a special ability of a composer is to be able to distinguish what is right from what is wrong, and then to leave aside whatever is wrong.  At the end I hope to have a piece and to express a particular mood, yes!\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C16\"\u003eThere has been an upsurge of interest in your work over the past 5 years. Has this affected you, your music and the way you compose?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003eNo, it hasn’t changed the way I compose. But I now have a clearer view on some aspects of my life and work: how much I appreciate having good relationships with my composer friends and colleagues, how important time and the process of waiting are to my work, and how much I’m a family person. And I have a greater awareness that I have to take care of all these things.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cimg style=\"float: none;\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/Carrouge_VD_JF_480x480.jpg?v=1751658234\"\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003eReview\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003e“Along with the general notion of \"landscape\", the words of Gustave Roud (1897 - 1976), a Swiss\/French writer\/poet, have served as a longstanding source of inspiration for Frey. This is a superbly curated selection of such works, maybe the finest single grouping of later Frey pieces I've heard. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003eA favorite aspect of Frey's music, for me, is his total lack of fear to deal with material that might be called conventionally beautiful, short melodies and sequences that \"pull at the heartstrings\". 'Paysage pour Gustave Roud' (Frey, clarinet; Stefan Thut, cello; Dante Boon, piano) is a particularly moving example of this, the two, three and four note passages just breathing with both melancholy and serene acceptance. As in a landscape, and in common with much of Frey's music in this area, there's a perfect balance of the expected--the way you expect a meadow to continue over a hillside--and the unexpected, as when a path disappears or a rock formation looms into view after an innocent turn. He often sets up small patterns of rhythm or melody, lasting just long enough for the listener to get comfortable, think, \"Ah, I know where this is going\" then, always gently, he shifts things, extends the duration of a beat, inserts the slightest bit of sourness into a sweet series of notes. This always strikes me as so true to life, always causes shivers of delight and recognition. The set of descending two-note patterns near the conclusion is just devastating. Such a fine work, hard to stop listening.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003e'Haut-Jorat' (Andrew Mcintosh, violin; Frey, clarinet; Boon, piano) is a suite of five brief passages. It's a bit more somber, more astringent than the previous work, the five sections interrupting any sense of languidness though each is slow, quiet and doesn't feel rushed. More like a set of glimpses through a window out into a cold and lovely landscape, a fleeting thought captured. In a way it reminds me of a tiny re-orchestrated, sliver of 'l'âme est sans retenue I', a similar feeling of the opening and closing of an aperture. Very lovely. 'Ombre si fragile' (Mcintosh, Thut and Boon' closes the two-disc set but echoes the first two pieces in general demeanor. Though sparer and more episodic, the sense of melodicism remains, the strings often playing together in grainy harmonics, the piano offsetting with darker commentary. There's a dusk-like feeling imparted and the piece ends with a lovely lack of resolution, simply evanescing.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003eThese three works surround two of substantially greater length, both profound. I'll say outright that 'La présence, les silences', played here by Dante Boon, is one of the finest pieces for solo piano I've heard in years. For my money, it should be part of the contemporary repertoire. Boon, of course, is an amazingly sensitive pianist and, according to Frey, plays the 41-minute work entirely from memory. Describing it is difficult without falling back into landscape tropes. It's not quite \"slow\" but is exceedingly patient, shifting from lengthily repeated single notes to bright chords and back, again beginning to give a hint of recurring patterns but never quite getting there. (As has happened in other recent, quiet piano pieces, the action of the pedals--or key levers?--is quite audible. This may be a distraction for some but I find it to be like a ghostly echo, a soft response to the notes and don't mind it at all). It's almost like one, slowly unfurling melody, with few signposts (perhaps only those repeated notes) as reference, more like a path leisurely walked upon but closely observed. Musically, I hear some vestiges of Satie's Rosicrucian period, the 'Ogives' and others, but that's very tangential. The music absorbs utterly.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003eFrey uses extracts from Gustave Roud's journals that cover a long period from 1916 - 1971 as the text for 'Farblose Wolken, Glück, Wind' (Colourless Clouds, Happiness, Wind), as well as a text of his own, in German, performed by Regula Konrad (soprano), Stephen Altoft (trumpet), Stefan Thut (cello) and Lee Ferguson (percussion). The Roud text is an interesting combination of the everyday, very plain spoken\/written and the subtly unworldly. In doing the translation, Frey didn't want any poetic license taken, instead asking us to (possibly) unearth the poetry contained in those basic terms. It was an odd venture, sometimes disorienting as when one could in no way get around the phrase, \"J'entends une fanfare\" (\"I hear a flourish of trumpets\"). And, at least to some extent, Frey deals with this literalness in the music, as becomes startlingly clear with the above example. It's not an easy . piece, lasting over 48 minutes and having a slightly more sour tonality than the other works on the album, but it's just as rich. Konrad's soprano has a hornlike quality and meshes wonderfully with both cello and (at first) subdued trumpet. I find the music less \"pathlike\", more stationary, as if the listener is sitting observing the landscape, and the weather, instead of walking through it. The tones are ghostly, foglike, at least for much of the piece. When that flourish of trumpets arrives, with accompanying snares, it has the shock of a thunderclap in blue sky (easily twenty times louder than anything heard previously in Frey's recorded catalogue) but serves as a fine tonic, an understanding about the variation in things, even when one has learned, as I feel Frey has, to view matters with more serenity and acceptance. It's a complex, marvellous work, one that has unfolded in many different ways each time I've listened.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C21\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eBrian Olewnick\u003c\/strong\u003e,\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eJust Outside\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Another Timbre","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51428525867322,"sku":"at115","price":18.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/at115Frey-Roud.jpg?v=1749637682"},{"product_id":"jurg-frey-magnus-granberg-early-to-late-ensemble-grizzana","title":"Jürg Frey \u0026 Magnus Granberg","description":"\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e1 - \u003cstrong\u003eMagnus Granberg\u003c\/strong\u003e  ‘How Vain Are All Our Frail Delights?’  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003e(2017)   40.50  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e2 -\u003cstrong\u003e J\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C11\"\u003eü\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003erg Frey\u003c\/strong\u003e  ‘Late Silence’  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003e(2017)   32.30    \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eEnsemble Grizzana:\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eJ\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003eürg Frey (clarinet), \u003cbr\u003eMagnus Granberg (celesta, harmonica \u0026amp; stones)\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eAngharad Davies \u0026amp; Mira Benjamin (violins), \u003cbr\u003eAnton Lukoszevieze (cello), \u003cbr\u003eDominic Lash (double bass),\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eJohn Lely (electronics, harmonica \u0026amp; stones), \u003cbr\u003eRichard Craig (flute \u0026amp; electronics), \u003cbr\u003ePhilip Thomas (piano),\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eSimon Allen (dulcimer \u0026amp; glass harp), \u003cbr\u003eDimitra Lazaridou-Chatzigoga (zither \u0026amp; electronics)\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eRecorded at Huddersfield University, November 2017\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\n\u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/E2L_Jurg_240x240.jpg?v=1751644819\" alt=\"\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; float: none;\"\u003e   \u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/E2L_Magnus_240x240.jpg?v=1751644853\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; float: none;\"\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003ch3 class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C15\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C16\"\u003eDominic Lash interviews \u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eJ\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003eürg\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e Frey and Magnus Granberg\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"yiv0744183970western-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"yiv0744183970western-C\"\u003eDominic -\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"yiv0744183970western-C-C0\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cem\u003eI'd like to ask about the titles of the two pieces. They're both so resonant and evocative. Late Silence makes me think of Late Spring, the Ozu film. I think the music has something of the same patience and poise – but also underlying tension and pathos – that one finds in that film. How Vain Are All Our Frail Delights obviously comes from the Philip Sidney poem that William Byrd set to music; I find I can't decide whether the music echoes or challenges the emotional register of the title. Would you both like to say something about the titles?\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eJ\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003eürg\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e–\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C1\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eNot being a movie connoisseur, I hadn’t heard of Late Spring by Ozu, but I may appreciate this connection with Ozu. For me\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003eLate Silence\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e means a field of allusions, and today I was looking back in my sketchbook to find how I came to the title. And it's interesting that I didn’t find this title anywhere in the sketchbook, but I did find some other attempts and words that circle round the possibilities of a title:\u003cbr\u003e\"Desires, Delights, Vainness\" (which obviously comes from the Byrd composition) \"Secret Garden\", \"The colour(s) of absence\", \"Fragility\", \"Deploration\" (which comes from the Ockeghem piece), \"Volatile Voices, Motionless Phrases\". \"Clouds, Circles, Melodies, Silences\". \"Ground, Material, Place\". \u003cbr\u003eIt seems that the title \"Late Silence\" came to the piece without a clear elaborated reason, but was prepared by the field of associations of other possible titles. It was suddenly there, and it displaced all the other words and allusions into the background. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eThis combination of process and sudden illumination is part of my experience not just for titles, but also for the work on a piece itself. And then, I feel, the title is right, and now I have to reflect and to find the words for my decision. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLate silence, late pieces - we know this connection to the late work of a composer, and the title speaks to this context too. And it's also a reference to the title \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003eDéploration sur la mort de Binchois\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e, by Johannes Ockeghem. It's a lamentation for the dead and the knowledge of a deep silence. \u003cbr\u003eAnd not least, it's a reflection on my work over a long time. After having written so many kinds of silences within the last 40 years, more and more I discover silence in the music itself.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eCalm and silence are close to each other, but separated. The music creates a secure room. As long as music sounds, we are inside this secure room. In the music of Ockeghem and Byrd, this room seems to be safe. In my music it's fragile and subtle, even the pathos and the tension you mention seem to be on frail ground. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C20\"\u003eMagnus\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C21\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e–\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003eAs you said, the title of my piece is a fragment from the poem by Philip Sydney which was set to music by William Byrd in his consort song ’O, Lord How Vain’, which itself served as an impetus for the music I wrote. Using a fragment of the lyrics of the song is on the one hand simply a way of recognizing and paying homage to the music that inspired me to write the piece, but on the other hand also reflects the method by which I use source materials from pre-existent musics as a point of departure for generating something different. Whether the music echoes or challenges the emotional register of the title is very much up to each one of us; there is no programmatic intent on my behalf. But from a strictly personal point of view, I’d say that I’m inclined to echo as much as challenge the question posed in Sidney’s poem: echoing it in the sense that the question he poses is in fact one that I’ve asked myself on a more or less a daily basis for some decades now. Challenging it, as Sidney suggests, not by disdaining all these pleasures, but by trying to treasure the ones that are worth treasuring. I guess all these ‘frail delights’ are simply what we’re left with in the end, and having the talent to cherish and enjoy them will probably make you a happier human being. Or, if I may put it this way: the frailer the delight, the greater the joy…\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C22\"\u003eDominic\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C23\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e -\u003c\/strong\u003e \u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eI believe that the commission for these pieces specifically involved writing music in some kind of relation to the pieces by Byrd and Ockeghem that you mentioned. Could you tell us a bit more about this?\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eJ\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003eürg\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C24\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e \u003c\/strong\u003e-\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eWhen Magnus and I met with Simon Reynell in a café in Huddersfield in autumn 2015, Simon commissioned new pieces from us both.  He also expressed a wish that the music should have some kind of relation to Renaissance music. It was a very open commission, with the musicians of the Grizzana Ensemble plus friends in mind, and this hint of a connection with early music.  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eFrom one of Simon's Facebook posts, maybe three years ago, I knew he had a special relation to \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003eDéploration sur la mort de Binchois\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e by Ockeghem. It was one of his favourite pieces to listen to at the time. And that's how I came across the piece and I listened to it quite often as well. So when Simon asked me for the new piece, it was clear that I would take it as a starting point. Later Magnus suggested \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003eHow Vain Are All Our Frail Delights\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e by Byrd, and I remember some lovely discussions with Magnus about how to proceed – using both of the pieces or just one of them, and which one, and could we agree on one piece or should we just leave it open. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C22\"\u003eDominic\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C23\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e \u003c\/strong\u003e- \u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eCould you tell us a little more about how the pieces were composed and notated? They give the performers very different tasks, and I'd also be interested to hear your thoughts about playing in each other's piece.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C20\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eMagnus\u003c\/strong\u003e -\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003eWell, my piece basically consists of a few different pools of materials (containing melodic and rhythmic fragments, extended melodies, single notes, chords, suggestions regarding timbre etc.) notated in conventional staff notation, along with some suggestions as to how to treat them, as well as a temporal structure which regulates when to play from which group of materials. Within these groups or pools of materials the musicians are free to choose what to play and when to play it, and the final outcome is very much a result of the superimpositions, juxtapositions and interactions of the musical materials, as well as of individual and collective processes of listening, deciding (intuitively or consciously), acting and interacting, or not interacting, with one another. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eAs regards how the musical materials themselves were composed, I took both Byrd’s and Ockeghem’s pieces as points of departure, using Byrd’s song somewhat more than the Ockeghem. Rhythmic phrases were sometimes quoted, sometimes fragmented or altered, at other times transposed to other meters, or rewritten as augmentations or diminutions. Running through the piece is a so-called ‘cantus firmus’, an extended melody in shifting meters which is played by the clarinet more or less throughout (and at times also by other instruments). Its shifting rhythms were arrived at by combining small modules of rhythmic materials derived from the two pieces. The tonal modes were also derived from both pieces as well as from a song by Jerome Kern, ’In Love in Vain’, which I got to thinking about while writing the piece, and which somehow started to resonate with me. The tonal and rhythmic materials were then subjected to certain methods and procedures in order to craft the melodic and harmonic materials that constitute the piece. As regards the temporal framework which regulates the ordering of the different groups of materials, it uses proportions found in the source materials, each group of materials being combined with a new time value more or less each time they reappear.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eI think that the experience of playing Jürg’s piece is quite different from playing mine. In Jürg’s score we are coordinated with one another to a much larger extent, and that demands particular forms of concentration, discipline and sensibility. This is obviously a different way of working and being within the music than when you’re allowed a greater amount of individual freedom of action, and the aspects of concentration, discipline and sensibility take on different forms. But I also think the two pieces have many things in common, and I’d be very interested to hear your perspective on the experience of playing in both pieces as well, Dominic.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eJ\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003eürg\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C24\"\u003e-\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eWhen I play a piece like Magnus' \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003eHow vain\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e, I'm involved as a clarinettist as well as a composer. As clarinet player, it was first of all a pleasure to play the music because everything sounded so good, the blending of the clarinet with glass harmonica, celesta, piano and zither was incredible. But it was also great to be in contact with the strings, the electronics and the colourful electronically modulated sounds of the flute, creating such a lively navigation through the whole duration of the music. \u003cbr\u003eAnd I really appreciated the role that Magnus invented for me with the cantus firmus, which is usually a prominent part of a composition. It does seem to be some kind of \"subject\" in this piece too, but then the score says: \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003eThe Cantus Firmus is (...) to be played very softly, almost silently\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e. And later: \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003e(...) the Cantus Firmus at times only being present within the mind of the performer. \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrom the point of view of a composer, I likewise enjoyed how good the piece sounded. So many different fragments fitting together perfectly, and foreground and background balanced in an enigmatic way. It maintains a perpetual suspense across forty minutes, and when I’d seen the score for the first time, I’d just seen a huge collection of snippets...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFor my piece, the material comes from Ockeghem, Byrd and myself - like three standpoints that are not mixed. The materials from Ockeghem and Byrd are used literally or slightly changed. So, for example, at the beginning of the piece, the hammered dulcimer and clarinet play the Byrd tune (and later Ockeghem, and then again Byrd), the violins play the Ockeghem melody, rhythmically transformed, and I myself added two notes for the piano, \"a\" and \"g\". This behaviour regarding the material is established at the very beginning in a strict way, and is also effective for decisions through the whole piece.\u003cbr\u003eThis process also speaks to a general focus in my daily work: how to find my music, be it in the notes from Ockeghem or in my own material. Recently I read this sentence by William Carlos Williams, which I’d like to quote here: \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003e\"The same thing exists, but in a different condition when energized by imagination\".\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C22\"\u003eDominic\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C23\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e- \u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFor me playing both pieces was very much to do with both trust and fragility, but in rather different senses. The way your piece is composed, Magnus, it almost feels like it can't go \"wrong\" if the musicians approach it with the right intention and spirit. Obviously some versions will be more successful than others, but that is beyond anybody's control. So the process of playing required great attentiveness, but was actually a calm and comfortable experience as long as you trusted the group and the music – in a sense the fragility seemed to lie more in the sounding result than the execution.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C23\"\u003eWith your piece, Jürg, there was a different kind of tension because it requires precise things to be played at very precise times. So this produced a slightly different kind of trust, which involved trusting the fragile balance (to echo the title of another of your pieces) between the various musicians and their various tasks as it developed in time. This balance was perhaps a little more like a tightrope walker's balance than is the case in Magnus's piece!\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C20\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eMagnus\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C21\"\u003e-\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eYes, I agree that concepts of trust and fragility relate to both Jürg’s and my music and feel central to both our work. And I think you’re right in pointing to the differences in how these concepts apply in these two cases. Being a composer-performer with a background in improvisation, and mostly playing my own music, it was wonderful getting to play Jürg’s music and to experience how differently these two concepts applied, while still having the most important aspects of them in common: the question of having trust in each other as individuals as well as a collective, and having trust in the music itself. And, if I may put it this way, to recognise and value the fragility of this trust.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C22\"\u003eDominic\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C25\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e-\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C23\"\u003eBoth pieces are very beautiful, but they don’t just contain obviously \"beautiful\" sounds – they also have elements of noise, of roughness, of plainness. I'm reminded of a well-known interview with Helmut Lachenmann by Paul Steenhuisen, in which he talks about teaching a class of children and showing them two photographs:\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C23\"\u003e“One was an attractive photograph of the movie star Sophia Loren. The other was a drawing by Albrecht Dürer, who had drawn a picture of his mother: very old, with a long nose, a bitter-looking face. She had had a hard life and her face was full of wrinkles. I showed them the two pictures and asked, 'Who is more beautiful?' They were totally confused, and then came a wonderful answer I will never forget – it was the highlight of my life. A girl said, 'I think the ugly one is more beautiful.'”\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C23\"\u003eDoes this kind of dialectical thinking have a relevance to the aesthetics of your musics? Or are there different kinds of relationships between the \"beautiful\" and the \"not-beautiful\" at work?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C20\"\u003eMagnus\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e- I guess most of us share the experience of the little girl in Lachenmann’s lovely anecdote: sometimes finding that things which deviate from a conventional and exclusive concept of beauty can be richer, more complex and rewarding, and more ‘truly’ beautiful than things that adhere exclusively to a more conventional and narrow definition of beauty. That said (and not being an expert either on aesthetics in general, or on dialectical aesthetics in particular), I guess I’m just trying to make a music which can hopefully do something to encompass and reconcile such categories with one another, making it a little easier to perceive and understand things without attaching too many preconceived notions to them. To be able to delight in the fragility of experience itself, I guess.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eJ\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003eü\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003erg\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C24\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e-\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003eI don’t want to stay too long with the Lachenmann quote; I think it says more about him than about the complexity of our experience of beauty. And – though in the context of that class it may work - I also think that for Lachenmann himself it’s not as simple as ‘the ugly is beautiful and vice versa’, as we know from his music. Moreover it refers to something that we know well from other music:  Monteverdi, Mozart... all the sad, ugly, terrible moments in their music which sound so incredibly beautiful.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eI looked at the two pictures on my computer - the drawing by Albrecht Dürer and a casual photograph of Sophia Loren - and I must confess that I can’t make a quick and easy decision. The two pictures represent separate categories and I see a very clear dividing line between them. Sophia Loren looks at the photographer, Albrecht Dürer looks at his mother.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eThe one is Sophia Loren, she looks beautiful, and she knows it. The other is Dürer’s mother, she doesn’t care how she looks, but it was Dürer who drew the picture, and with all his craft and imagination he made this impressive work, and he knows it.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eLet me talk about my experience when I compose. Now I’m in Dürer’s place and I use all the possibilities of my craft to make a piece that sounds good, independently of whether the sounds are in the conventional sense beautiful or not. I like my sounds, I have a relation to them and I want to give them the possibility of existing in my piece. I create a ground and a musical environment for them to sound good. And I’m looking for reasons for them to be beautiful.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eBut to sound beautiful is not a task in itself. Beauty happens as a sideline. When beauty comes into focus as an end in itself, then beauty begins to disappear. The work may touch a border, but I keep the idea of beauty outside.  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eI also know this: sometimes sounds might come in the Sophia Loren mood; they pose for the audience. But it's not the sounds themselves that do so, it’s the composer who doesn’t prevent the sound from doing so.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eI have never thought about the ugly and the beautiful in a dialectic sense in my music. Beauty is fluid, and even authenticity, as an idea behind beauty, is not a sure fact; it’s fragile and has to be worked out anew in each piece. I never consider the fragile surface in my music as a source of beauty. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\n\u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/E2L_Jurg_Dom_240x240.jpg?v=1751644912\" alt=\"\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; float: none;\"\u003e   \u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/E2L_Jurg2_240x240.jpg?v=1751644949\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; float: none;\"\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003ch3 class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eFrom reviews\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e\"\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"No-Spacing-C\"\u003eFor all their newness, these works are played by Grizzana play with deep knowledge and empathy for this style of music. After all, both composers play as part of the group. They respond to the contrasting expectations in the scores (Granberg allowing freedoms, Frey specifying precision) with great discipline, a studied awareness of how sounds may arise and combine. This judgement, restraint without hesitation, brings countless small, brilliant details to the ear’s attention in a natural, spontaneous way that never seems forced.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"No-Spacing-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"No-Spacing-C\"\u003eListening to Granberg’s Nattens skogar last year I commented that “I’m starting to think of Magnus Granberg’s music the way I think of late Morton Feldman: each one is the same yet each one is different.” On this CD, his How Vain Are All Our Frail Delights? combines individual sounds and small fragments of material into a type of mobile structure, allowing the musicians to draw from one group or another at different times. A resemblance to late Feldman comes here from the sense of hearing patterns overlap and repeat, only never quite the same. The music feels like one extended moment, constantly changing in appearance but never changing in substance. Most strikingly, compared to previous works I’ve heard by Granberg, is the sense of a steady flow, if not a pulse, behind the piece. The counterpoint between the instruments forms a strong but delicate web that holds the sounds together. Wisps and shards of electronic sounds permeate this texture, which create an effect that makes the notes played by the acoustic intruments less like pitches and more like sounds. Like his preceding pieces, it again takes its inspiration from existing music; in this case, William Byrd’s consort song “O, Lord How Vain”. With this in mind, its possible to hear the music in light of the Elizabethan’s awareness of mortality – a defence, fragile but assured.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"No-Spacing-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"No-Spacing-C\"\u003eI neglected to write here about the last Another Timbre release of Frey’s music, Collection Gustave Roud (that’s coming up in the next issue of Tempo). In the two longer works in that collection, there’s a sense of movement in Frey’s music that has been steadily developing in recent years. From the earlier wanderings of his pianist, alone pieces, there now comes the feeling of the music being a journey: not a traditional sense of arrival at a destination, but of the travelling itself, similar to Nono’s late lontananzas. Here, his Late Silence shows no reticence about addressing its subject with sound. It’s a sombre, tender work. As with Granberg’s piece, mortality is present: the inspiration comes from Ockeghem’s lament Déploration sur la mort de Binchois. The journey here is one of the emotions, of thought.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"No-Spacing-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"No-Spacing-C\"\u003ePairings of instruments call and respond, in slow antiphonies. Their sounds combine in surprising ways, letting harmonics and pure tones linger. Unlike the Granberg, no electronics here, but there are harmonicas and stones, used in the same way as in Frey’s epic meditation on time and space Weites Land, Tiefe Zeit. Even more suprising is when the sounds change, as intruments drop away to replaced by others. One feels the loss as much as the new arrival. Other lonely episodes are encountered, but are never allowed to have the last word. I found listening to it a profoundly moving experience, encompassing a range of experience that belied its relatively brief length of just over 30 minutes.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"No-Spacing-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"No-Spacing-C\"\u003eI can’t remember if Cage was referring to Zen or his own preferences when he said that the purpose of the artist is to hide beauty. Both Granberg and Frey touch upon this matter of beauty in art. (Frey: “Beauty happens as a sideline. When beauty comes into focus as an end in itself, then beauty begins to disappear.” Granberg: “I guess I’m just trying to make a music which can hopefully do something to encompass and reconcile such categories with one another.”) Yet still, both composers have developed their craft to a point where they can let beauty be revealed rather than leave the listener to find it.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"No-Spacing-C-C0\"\u003eBen Harper,\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"No-Spacing-C-C1\"\u003eBoring Like a Drill\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"No-Spacing-P-P0\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"normal-c-c101-C\"\u003e\"One of the many fascinations of\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"normal-c-c101-C-C0\"\u003eEarly to Late\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"normal-c-c101-C\"\u003eis that Frey and Granberg were given the same brief and ended up producing different end results. Granberg’s ethereal “How Vain Are All Our Frail Delights?” allows players greater individual freedom than Frey’s more tightly co-ordinated “Late Silence”. In addition to the core instruments, from the options available within Ensemble Grizzana, Granberg and Frey chose to add quite different instruments, giving their pieces contrasting sound palettes; Granberg played celesta on his own piece alongside glass harp and dulcimer played by Simon Allen, zither by Dimitra Lazaridou-Chatzigoga and electronics by her, Richard Craig and John Lely; Frey chose for Granberg and Lely to both play harmonica and stones.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"No-Spacing-P-P0\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"normal-c-c101-C\"\u003eDespite such methodological differences, Frey’s and Granberg’s works complement one another so perfectly that they sound designed to be heard together. By meticulous placement of silences and sounds, each of them slowly but surely creates a mood compatible with Ockeghem and Byrd, one of exquisite melancholy. The resulting music is so subtly restrained and beautiful that anything played immediately after it can easily sound crass or tawdry by comparison. Consequently, this is one of those rare albums that one feels compelled to play again as soon as it is over. Ultimately,\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"normal-c-c101-C-C0\"\u003eEarly to Late\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"normal-c-c101-C\"\u003emust be judged to be a quintessential Another Timbre album, and surely there can be no higher recommendation than that. Already on my ‘best of 2018’ list.”   \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"normal-c-c101-C-C1\"\u003eJohn Eyles\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"No-Spacing-P-P0\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"normal-c-c101-C-C1\"\u003e\"\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Wp-normal-c-c101-C Sz-normal-c-c101-C-140px\"\u003eWhat Granberg does so well with these pieces, and why he's become one of my favourite modern composers, is that he writes music in a way that feels like he's transcribing emotions rather than notes. The music is wide open and the performers can play with a huge amount of personality, but a certain emotional atmosphere is always held. In the past, that atmosphere was typically one of ambiguous melancholy. That may be true for this piece as well, but I think I'd rather call it nostalgic melancholy. The music is cold and uncanny, but it feels reminiscent of something more beautiful – perhaps that's of the original pieces, or just of something personal and ambiguous. Either way, the result is fantastically moving.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-No-Spacing-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Wp-normal-c-c101-C Sz-normal-c-c101-C-140px\"\u003eI'd like to point out that the performances here are fantastic. Although I'm sure the performers have plenty of freedom, they play with great personal restraint. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Wp-normal-c-c101-C Sz-normal-c-c101-C-140px\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-No-Spacing-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Wp-normal-c-c101-C Sz-normal-c-c101-C-140px\"\u003eThe second piece is Jürg Frey's 32-minute Late Silence. For those unfamiliar with the music of Jürg Frey, he is one of the pioneers of the Wandelweiser Collective and of contemporary lowercase (ultra-quiet, ultra-minimal) composition. At around the turn of the century, Frey was writing some of the most minimal music one could imagine. Over recent years his avant-garde nature has become more relaxed, finding room for melody and conventional musical beauty. His 2017 Another Timbre release, Collection Gustave Roud, featured a 48-minute piece titled Farblose Wolken, Glück, Wind which was likely his most ambitious piece yet. The piece drifted along in slow movements which seemed to have little to do with each other, several of the movements would even seem to entirely forget the performers who were just playing so beautifully. The piece had many conventional examples of melody and harmony, making it easily enjoyable, but as a whole it felt odd and full of confusing ideas. It was, in my opinion, Frey's greatest piece yet. Late Silence can easily be seen as its successor.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-No-Spacing-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Wp-normal-c-c101-C Sz-normal-c-c101-C-140px\"\u003eLike Farblose Wolken, Glück, Wind, Late Silence drifts by in odd movements. Despite the ten-man ensemble, there are seldom ever moments where over three musicians play together. The first movement lasts about 7 minutes and consists of a slow-paced repetitive piano exploration while surrounding strings provide uncomfortable support. Further movements have strings swell over the droning sound of scraping stones and violins and harmonicas exchanging harmonizing tones. Two particular moments feature brief piano solos. Although they're short, they're the most memorable moments of the whole album for me. They're beautiful and minimal, recalling Frey's fantastic Pianist, Alone pieces. The piano does sound beautiful on its own, but it's the odd place within the composition that it makes it stand out as so truly special. It feels like an individual composition within itself – it utilizes a repetitive descending melody which sounds nothing like anything else in the piece, although it does sound like some of Frey's former work. In the next movement we return to the same style of large ensemble abstraction, and it feels as if the gorgeous piano solo was immediately forgotten – no evidence was left behind.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-No-Spacing-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Wp-normal-c-c101-C Sz-normal-c-c101-C-140px\"\u003eUnlike in Granberg's piece, Late Silence removes both electronic musicians and opts for a completely acoustic ensemble. The music is soft and relaxed, although it still invokes similar themes to Granberg's piece. The strange crossroad between ugly and beautiful still appears, tugging at the listeners emotions in odd ways. The nostalgic melancholy returns as well – the music's cold present seems to long for a warmer past. The layout of the composition may even play into this theme itself – could the oddly placed piano solo, as past-leaning as it was, represent a nostalgic look backwards to a beauty which is no longer anywhere to be found?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-No-Spacing-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Wp-normal-c-c101-C Sz-normal-c-c101-C-140px\"\u003ePresented back-to-back, these pieces work well. Although the pieces are fairly different from each other, they share enough common themes and aesthetics to allow Early to Late to be a comfortable listen. Magnus Granberg and Jürg Frey again prove themselves to be two of the strongest contemporary composers, although neither of the pieces fall far from either of their comfort zones. But still, Early to Late is a wonderful release which comes far from disappointing. I eagerly wait for more commissioned material from Another Timbre.”\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-No-Spacing-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"normal-c-c101-C-C3\"\u003eConnor Kurtz\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Another Timbre","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51428562207034,"sku":"at121","price":10.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/at121FreyGranberg.jpg?v=1749638047"},{"product_id":"klas-lang-golden-fur-beissel","title":"Klas Lang \u0026 Golden Fur","description":"\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eAustrian composer Klaus Lang and the ensemble Golden Fur re-imagine the unusual musical world of the eighteenth century Baptist leader Johann Conrad Beissel. Beissel was devoutly religious, and, coming to the USA from Germany in 1730, founded a Utopian religious community in Pennsylvania, for whom he wrote a huge amount of church music.  He developed his own compositional system which he said was given to him by angels, and which has been described as a very early pre-cursor of serialism.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eKlaus Lang\u003c\/strong\u003e - church organ         \u003cstrong\u003eSamuel Dunscombe\u003c\/strong\u003e - clarinets\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C7\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eJudith Hamann\u003c\/strong\u003e - cello               \u003cstrong\u003eJames Rushford\u003c\/strong\u003e - viola \u0026amp; harmonium\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eRecorded at the abbey at St Lambrecht near Styria in Austria.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/DSC1120_480x480.jpg?v=1751623224\" alt=\"\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; float: none;\"\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\n\u003ch2 class=\"List-Paragraph-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"List-Paragraph-C\"\u003eInterview with the members of Golden Fur\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eHow did your collaboration with Klaus Lang come about?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C11\"\u003eJames Rushford\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e: Golden Fur has followed Klaus' work since we formed in 2008. We actually did an Australian premiere of his 'Der Weg Des Prinzen I' in 2009, and have also played much of his repertoire individually\/with separate ensembles (I know Judith has played some strong pieces in Mexico, and Sam did a version of 'Hungrige Sterne' at Tectonics Festival in 2015).\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eI was also invited to collaborate with Klaus as a duo for Tectonics New York back in 2014. We made a funny fragmentary piece made up of duets on harmonium, clavichord and viola. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eWe've always wanted to work with Klaus as improvisers and interpreters. We reached out to him whilst on residence at Cité des Arts in Paris 2016, and he was very generous to invite us to stay with him in the Austrian Alps for a few days. There was no fixed plan to compose or record anything, but after playing together each day, the idea for the Beissel piece slowly formed. Klaus has access to this wonderful monastery (St. Lambrecht), so we took the opportunity to record there.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eAnd how did Golden Fur come about? What has the trio done before this?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C11\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eJudith Hamann\u003c\/strong\u003e: \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eGolden Fur is a trio which began in 2008 while we were undertaking our Masters degrees together in Australia. Originally focused on performing new or rarely heard compositions, the ensemble started out with a run of concert series which unfolded over several years. During this phase of the group we commissioned many new works by Australian artists, alongside presenting the Australian premieres of works by international composers (including Klaus). Golden Fur have performed at festivals including Tectonics (Athens and Tel Aviv), Supersense Festival of Ecstatic Music (Melbourne), Liquid Architecture (Australia), and for the Monday Evening Concerts (Los Angeles) to name just a few. The group have also been artists in residence at The Recollets (Paris) and Cité Internationale des Arts (Paris). Over time and various configurations of geography the aims and interests of the project have changed (all three of us lived in southern California for some years). While Golden Fur still occasionally perform notated music, the group now primarily works on collectively composed, or collaborative projects with other artists. Currently in the works is a project with writer Dennis Cooper and film maker Zac Farley, as well as partially composed, partially improvised works for cello, clarinet and keyboard instruments composed in the studio or presented live.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eWhat was your interest in Johann Conrad Beissel’s music, and how did you use Beissel's music in the piece, and w What was your interest in Johann Conrad Beissel's music, and how is it used in the piece?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C11\"\u003eSamuel Dunscombe\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e: Our interest in Beissel’s music came through Klaus, originally.  He had recently returned from a trip to the USA where he had visited Ephrata, which Beissel founded as an experimental religious community of Seventh Day Dunkers in 1732.  Beissel’s story is utterly weird, and utterly compelling.  Ephrata was sort of an early utopian community organised on semi-socialist principles, where all members were to maintain a strict vegetarian diet, celibacy was encouraged (though not required), and upon joining all were required to adopt a new name (Beissel himself became “Friedsam Gottrecht” - Peaceful God’s Justice).  Music was at the heart of everyone’s life in Ephrata, and the hymns were all composed by Beissel himself, who had developed an algorithmic system for translating bible text into music.  I guess what attracted us to the Beissel story was firstly the unique (and slightly batty) nature of the community at Ephrata, and secondly the weirdness of Beissel’s music itself.  Beissel’s rigid compositional process makes for music that is both beautiful, and strangely disjointed and asymmetrical, with a beautiful sort of naivety to the whole thing.  I think the three of us are quite attracted to things that are somehow a little strange, out of the ordinary, or that somehow don’t quite fit, so we got excited when Klaus enthusiastically told us the Beissel story.  It seemed like a natural choice to pick one of his hymns and use it as the basic scaffolding for a collective composition.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhen it came to makIng the piece you hear on the record, we decided to adopt a loose algorithmic system of our own, that would dictate the arrangement \/ orchestration, dynamic movement, harmonic density, harmonicity, etc of the chosen hymn.  We decided that we would like to record a version a little over 45 minutes long, and this length we achieved simply by dilating the time it should ordinarily take to play through the hymn (by a factor of 20 or 30 times).  So I guess you could say the piece on the CD is sort of like a 21st century re-imagining of his music and working processes.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e\u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/DSC1117_480x480.jpg?v=1751623454\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; float: none;\"\u003e  \u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/beissel_3.jpg?v=1751623503\" alt=\"\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Another Timbre","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51428616339770,"sku":"at135","price":6.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/at135Beisselfrontcover.jpg?v=1749639167"},{"product_id":"loiter-volcano","title":"Angharad Davies | Klaus Lang | Anton Lukoszevieze","description":"\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eA 52-minute piece jointly composed and performed by:\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eAngharad Davies\u003c\/strong\u003e (violin), \u003cstrong\u003eKlaus Lang\u003c\/strong\u003e (harmonium) and \u003cstrong\u003eAnton Lukoszevieze\u003c\/strong\u003e (cello)\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eRecorded during a residency at Dai Hall in Huddersfield, March 2020.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003e\u003cimg style=\"display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/unfurling_photo.jpg?v=1752399815\" alt=\"\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv id=\"txt_2229\"\u003e\n\u003ch3 class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C11\"\u003eInterview with Angharad Davies and Anton Lukoszevieze\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C11\"\u003econducted by Christian Smith\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: start;\" id=\"txt_2230\"\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C\"\u003eCS: How did this project come about?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eAL: The project was instigated by Simon Reynell (and I think Ryoko Akama as well?) I think it was Simon’s idea for the album. I have played with Angharad over many years in different situations, but never with Klaus, so this opportunity was a blessing for me.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eAD: Looking back at an email I received at the end of 2019, Simon Reynell and (yes!) Ryoko Akama were keen to organise a series of concerts in Huddersfield for 2020 and wondered whether I would be interested in doing a joint event with Klaus Lang. I had never met Klaus but had heard his music and knew that a few of my friends had worked with him and spoke very highly of the experience so I was keen to find ways to make this happen. I’ve known Anton for at least 20 years now, in fact my very first concert in London, when I moved here in 2002, was with him and John Lely at Conway Hall on the 14\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C1\"\u003eth\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003eFeb organised by the LMC. I hold this concert as a significant turning point in the trajectory of where my music was heading at that time. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C\"\u003eCS: How did you make decisions about sound world, form, and pitch material? Did you start out playing and improvising right away? \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eAL: I seem to remember we sat down together for about 10 minutes and discussed some loose structural ideas, which included some archetypal materials and then just started playing together. It really was a very simple and special process for me - it just felt right and each of us was attuned to each other’s sonic worlds and input. It was a complete joy to do.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eAD: We started playing immediately despite the cold. The sound world, form, and pitch material emerged as we went along. It was instantaneous and I remember wondering if it was really possible for it to be so easy. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C\"\u003eCS: This recording is from a rehearsal the final day of the residency before the concert, how did the two sessions differ?  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eAL: That is a difficult question to answer, these differences are very subtle. In many ways all recordings were quite similar, the same duration (which was pre-determined), the same order of sections. However, within those parameters a whole different universe emerges with each playing. We were of course improvising, so every ‘version’ would be different but similar - a bit like viewing a complex sculpture from multiple angles. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eAD: As I recall they were close, and for me both equally as immersive with regard to structure and flow which made it easy to step into, to be held and be embedded in the piece. What I like in this version from the afternoon rehearsal in particular is that it is void of that framing which a concert inevitably gives, and so what you have here is a very honest, truthful unfolding, feeling our way, a marking, an intimate learning of the piece, and genuine moments of getting lost within.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C\"\u003eCS: Yes - it's intriguing how a concert situation inevitably affects the decisions you make as a performer, either by the energy in the room or the literal acoustic change of the space.  I have tried to get into the habit myself of recording soundchecks if at all possible, because those runs are usually the most raw and unfiltered. I did have a concert recently where my mic stand fell apart, and that produced unthought of possibilities and playing positions as I held the top half of the mic stand between my legs for the remainder of the performance. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eAD: I like those words raw and unfiltered......and yes as you describe those unexpected situations where you are caught up trying to do something else that might not be apparent to the listener and which brings a quality of inhibition that I find very interesting. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C\"\u003eCS: Why did you choose ‘unfurling’ as the project name? \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eAL: I saw the word on the wall in the AME venue in Huddersfield, and I suggested it. I liked the unfurling, unfolding, material aspect of the word which implied for me a process of music emerging and literally unfurling as we played.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eOf course music happens in real time, so it seemed logical but poetic to me to use that word.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eAD: A slow opening up ……reveal. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C\"\u003eCS: I had the same feeling listening to the record.  If I can go a bit deeper into my own mental image of the music, I really heard the three of you as a ship on a calm sea, creaking and lightly bobbing, and then every now and then letting the sails down.  At the end I really felt as if the ship was disintegrating before my eyes. Could you say that there are three periods of Unfurling within the record?  There seem to be clear pitch worlds at each of these points, were they predetermined? \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eAL: That is a difficult question. I like the fact that you developed this image of the ship and periods of unfurling within your own mind through listening, and I would not like to try to ‘clarify’ our interpretation of our work, and its structural processes, in relation to the title Unfurling. The more solid, pitch-based sections were in 3 parts and the outer\/inner more abstract sections merged and emerged into these. No specific pitches or harmonies were ever established, the music is purely improvised. Lastly, referring again to the title of the work, I like to think it is poetic and can work in macro and micro throughout the duration of the music, focusing and defocusing in a continuum.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C\"\u003eCS: That's really fascinating, I also have yet to have the experience of 'determining' pitch sets in a context like this. I was just wondering because it sounds very coordinated, but I think that's a testament to how in tune to each other you all were, as well as the magic of improvisation. I’d like to finish by asking you each a question about your individual work. Anton, what kind of work do you do as an artist? What was the material and process of making the artwork for this album?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eAL: I work in many different media, mainly photography, video, painting, drawing and collages, but I also compose and make sound installations. The work on the cover is what is known technically as a ‘chromoskedasic silver gelatin photogram print’. It is made first by overpainting a sheet of glass, this covers the entire surface. I then draw by scratching into the surface of the paint. The glass is then overlaid onto a sheet of silver gelatin photographic paper.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eThe glass and paper are then subjected to different levels of light exposure under an enlarger. I also move the glass plate and make multiple exposures. I then develop the print in different chemicals which react with the silver in the paper’s surface and create colours and hues. The final image is fixed and the print washed and dried.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C\"\u003eCS: Angharad, I was listening to some of your other work on \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C2\"\u003eAnother Timbre\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C\"\u003e, including, ‘ffansion | fancies’ , which you recorded with Tisha Mukarji, and I was hearing a lot of similar sound production techniques that I heard here.  What do you like to hear from your instrument, and how have you come to these sounds over the course of your career? \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eAD: Since the lockdown I’ve had time to revisit some of my archive (especially those recordings that I had good intentions for but they end up buried in my computer or in a box full of indecipherably labelled mini discs or blank CDs without their covers) and it’s interesting reconnecting with some of those lost sounds and wondering why they haven’t been carried forward. A lot was lost with their preparations but there are some techniques that I still carry with me like circular bowing, tremolo, pizzicato and col legno that I find useful to propel the music forward. There are some specific preparations that I use here too, such as the spring and plastic peg that I would have used in ffansion|fancies. But I’m not convinced that I’m lead by what I’d like to hear from my violin, but more by the conditions of being able to place a sound into each context – of it making sense, of it being heard or not heard, its timing….or nowadays placing myself in situations where I’m not falling back on safe familiar sounds but of course finding myself doing exactly that! Ultimately what I want to hear from my violin is so dependent on who I play with or the space I play in.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C3\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C\"\u003eCS: I love this idea of a history of sounds - how they tell a story of a life. I can place the emersion of a technique or instrumental sound in my memory, producing an almost nostalgic feeling when I come back to it.  I have been doing my own small recording projects on my own over the past month, and in the process of overdubbing and layering, I find myself playing in a very new way as I'm literally playing music with different versions of myself through the process. Have you been doing any recording yourself, and how do you see your practice continuing in a post COVID-19 world?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eAD: I have actually. The second weekend of lockdown and exactly a month after my last live concert I was asked to play live on skype for Mariam Razei's TOPH which was then broadcast on\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Hyperlink-C\"\u003etwitch.tv\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003e. Then Tim Parksinson and I did a small show on zoom for Nomi Epstein's curation of Quarantine concerts on the 19th April. I guess they’re not strictly recording because they were intended as live performances but since they are archived they’ve turned into experiments into a new way of recording sound. The first solo was more or less what I would do live, but by the second solo it didn't seem appropriate to just play the violin conventionally so I zoomed right in and started holding the violin in a different way......allowing the visual to lead.....and by playing extremely close to the camera I started to use the table underneath to prop my violin up and using it as a sound source as well. Looking back at both these solos the latency that I have no control over has created a completely different performance to what I actually played! \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eAs for actual recording experiments it’s very early days to comment on what I’m doing and almost impossible to see how my practice will continue post COVID-19. I’ve felt very uncreative and don’t feel like playing my violin. Let’s say though that I’ve been inspired by Adam Bohman’s dictaphone diaries, Ryoko Akama’s daily sculptures and thinking a lot about Emma Hart’s work. And I’ve been grateful for having time to explore my local park most days, and woodland paths that I would never have had the time or made the time to follow, and revelling in the beauty of trees and the overwhelming greenery that I think I can see now all the better for the lack of planes and a turning down of the constant din of traffic along the North Circular. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003e\u003cimg style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; float: none; display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/unfurling_image_2_480x480.jpg?v=1752400094\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Another Timbre","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51428938809658,"sku":"at154","price":6.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/at154_Davies_Lang_Lukoszevieze_-_unfurling.jpg?v=1752399543"},{"product_id":"jurg-frey-borderland-melodies-apartment","title":"Jürg Frey","description":"\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C21\"\u003e1  \u003cstrong\u003eBorderland Melodies    \u003c\/strong\u003e(2019)     18:21\u003cbr\u003eKerry Yong, piano    Mira Benjamin, violin    Anton Lukoszevieze, cello\u003cbr\u003eHeather Roche, clarinet    Raymond Brien, bass clarinet\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C21\"\u003e2  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"normal-c-c22\"\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.5pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eL’état de simplicité   \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.5pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003e (2021)   21:30\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C21\"\u003eMira Benjamin, violin    Bridget Carey, viola   Anton Lukoszevieze, cello\u003cbr\u003eHeather Roche, clarinet    Raymond Brien, bass clarinet\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"normal-c-c22\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.5pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003e3  \u003cstrong\u003eMovement, Ground, Fragility   \u003c\/strong\u003e(2014\/2020)    31:43\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C21\"\u003eKerry Yong, piano    Mira Benjamin, violin    Bridget Carey, viola\u003cbr\u003eAnton Lukoszevieze, cello    Simon Limbrick, percussion\u003cbr\u003eHeather Roche, clarinet    Raymond Brien, bass clarinet\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/Ju-rg_Frey_FOTO_3_zvg_09e4df82-2d4b-48ce-af0d-1204805c5f1d_480x480.jpg?v=1751485842\" alt=\"\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; float: none;\"\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\n\u003ch2 class=\"Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C6\"\u003eInterview with Jürg Frey\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003eThis CD was planned a long time ago, but then delayed by the Covid pandemic. What was the thinking behind the album, and how did that change?  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eThe original idea had been for a CD of pieces that use both clarinet and bass clarinet, which would have given me the opportunity to play alongside Heather Roche, Apartment House’s regular clarinetist. However, the pandemic intervened and limited my activities as a player. Then I was seriously ill for a few weeks at the beginning of the year, and had to think fundamentally about my future activities as a player. As a result, I decided to stop playing the clarinet, so the original idea behind the album was changed.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eBut in terms of the pieces on the CD, there was a positive side to the delays. The repeated postponements gave me the opportunity to play through the new piece I’d composed for the recording session, “L’état de simplicité”, again and again for myself. Through this extra time, I discovered ways to make things clearer, to go forward step by step, and to bring the pieces to a point I hadn’t expected before.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003eAs you've been playing, and teaching, clarinet for decades, does it feel strange to stop playing the instrument?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eNo, it’s not strange. Having spent more than 50 years of my life with the clarinet, it is now a unique experience to have some time ahead of me in which the clarinet no longer plays a role. There are no regrets. I have played so much, classical and new repertoire, the clarinet has opened many, many doors for me to people and musicians, to hearts of friends, and to different kinds of music.  It is a wonderful past. And now this completely unexpected and new experience that arises when you no longer do something and leave something behind that shaped your life before.  I am glad that I can have this experience.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003eDo you also think about retiring from composition?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eNo, stopping composing was never an option. As a clarinet player, I can always be replaced, as this recording now proves most beautifully.  But as a composer, only I can write my own pieces. I don't think you can replace me.\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eJ\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eAnd as long as I feel I have something to say and as long as I find or invent reasons to write new pieces, I will continue.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eAnd I still love to work with musicians and ensembles, to be part in the process of rehearsals and preparing concerts with my music. This will go on, and I’m very happy about that.  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"List-Paragraph-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"List-Paragraph-C\"\u003eTell us about the pieces on the new CD. Firstly ‘Borderland Melodies’: the title references landscape, which is something that seems to underlie a lot of your music. Why and how do you work with a sense of landscape?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eI’d like to say something about this reference to landscape because, yes, it is an important factor underlying my music. But to avoid any misunderstanding: it is never about programmatic music. It is never about the illustration of any landscape. The relation to landscape is a conceptual underground. Both composition and landscape have these elements in common:  time\/duration, form\/shape and material.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eThe concept of \"landscape\" opens up very different perceptions. It can be a wild landscape, an empty landscape, a landscape developed over a thousand years. Or just a taste of landscape, in the evening light. Or a landscape slightly or strongly shaped by people.  Or an industrial landscape. A view over hundreds of miles, or a small field in the backyard. And the surface of a landscape is a wide range of sensibilities: stones, rocks, woods, grass, sand - colorful or monochrome. And then there are all the artificially designed landscapes: gardens, places of contemplation, and an image of the human imagination. Japanese gardens are an articulation of philosophy and history. The austere and symmetric form of French Baroque gardens make them beautiful to walk in, but is also the image of a monarchical social structure.  English gardens that suggest natural growth, but behind which lies a subtle design plan. And not to forget, many, many private gardens, maybe on a balcony, or simply small place next to a road junction, to create a little world, or to let it be and leave the garden to itself.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eI can relate many of these thoughts to my music. But you mustn't think of it as a working principle. It is not the basis of my work. The basis is always in the musical thinking and the compositional craft. But occasionally the idea of a garden or landscape flashes up, and sometimes helps me to find a way out of a stuck corner in the compositional process. I find the idea of landscape and garden inspiring. And both landscape and composition have in common that they are about time, with things or sounds in it. When a piece is finished, I can find traces of these common ideas again, and that sometimes can influence the title of the piece.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"List-Paragraph-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"List-Paragraph-C\"\u003eSecondly the new piece, ‘L’état de simplicité’. What does the title – and the movement titles – refer to?  Generally you write single movement pieces, but this has four distinct – and distinctly different – movements. Is there a reason for this?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eThe title sounds a bit like the title of a treatise, or a collection of essays. That’s very different from a long single movement piece. It’s a challenge to work with long durations, with different energies, movements and standstills, balances of material, and to form everything into a great whole. These work processes are not easy to survey because they relate to long durations in the piece. It’s complex; it’s about construction and intuition, you have to focus on details, but at the same time you need to be all over the piece.  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eRecently I wrote two pieces, each of which is an hour long and has individual movements. The 4th String Quartet has five movements, and\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003eLes signes passagers\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003efor pianoforte has seven movements. There is also a sequence here, but it is divided into single movements, like one chapter after another, and you can sometimes wait a while.  But taken as a whole, there is a clear sequence and a formal direction. But with\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003eL’état de simplicité\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003ethings are different. There are four individual movements, each dealing with a separate theme, resulting in the distinct differences you mention.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003e‘A treatise at the edge of the sense’ is the title of the first piece. Why that?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003eÀ la limite du sens\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003eis a little essay in sound about musical meaning. In the background is the personal experience that structural logic does not necessarily make musical sense. It is difficult to say whether there is such a thing as \"logic\" in music at all, but \"illogical\" things can sound most fascinating in music. There is a fine line between whether something sounds like it makes sense or not. And simply making sense is nothing either. When I compose, I often operate on the edge of sense.  Or in other words, I work in an area that seems meaningless to me, and gradually and I make sense of it little by little. In the end, when we hear the piece, we accept what we hear. And yet we can hear how the music balances on a fine line that keeps the edge of the sense, the question of \"why?\", perceptible and present.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003eThe second movement is called \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C15\"\u003etoucher l'air\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003e....\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eYes, the title describes the situation when a player plays a note and makes the air vibrate. He touches the air. It takes very little to touch the air. So it is also a general description of the musical situation. And the French word\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003eair\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003ehas another meaning: melody. There is a slight appearance of the idea of melody in the piece.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003eAnd what are the ‘neutral zones’?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eIn the last piece I refer to a term I have occasionally come across in the novels of Patrick Modiano:\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003eLes zones neutres.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003eIn his books, such spaces appear.  A street, not empty, not busy, maybe a neighbourhood shop or a disused car repair shop, a few trees, an almost empty pavement... everything is balanced so that it falls into a state that is nothing special. But when we are in such a neutral zone, we notice something unique to that zone that is not easily forgotten.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eAnd it’s the same with this piece: cello pizzicato, somewhere between scales and melodies, not chaotic and also not very pronounced. The other instruments sometimes play chords, nothing special, just chords. But again it is this paradox: once you have heard the piece, you don't easily forget it and you will recognise it on another encounter. This is the characteristic of a neutral piece.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C1\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"List-Paragraph-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"List-Paragraph-C\"\u003eFinally ‘Movement, Ground, Fragility’, which I understand is a re-working of a slightly older piece for new instrumentation. In what context was the piece first written, and how has it changed?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eI wrote the piece in 2014 for a concert in Minneapolis. It was a weekend Wandelweiser festival organized by Jesse Goin. For our recording, I adapted the instrumentation to the musicians of Apartment House. The electric guitar was transformed into a cello part, and the melodica\/harmonica part is now viola.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"List-Paragraph-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"List-Paragraph-C\"\u003eDoes the title “Movement, Ground, Fragility” again refer to an idea of landscape?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003eAt the very most a glimmer of it. The piece begins with a strict structure of viola and percussion, something like a ground, to form an architecture. Individual tones and dyads appear, of varying size and colors, unsystematically.  The two forces, a clear structure, and sounds that simply happen, unfold their effectiveness. And then follows a short section in the low register. After the recording, Anton Lukoszevieze said about this part of the piece: “I never have played such a slow Blues before”. The second half of the piece is more left to itself. The surface of the music can’t be precisely controlled by the players; melodic fragments and different tempos appear. Sometimes the sounds are notated in the form of lists, and sounds from this list come to the surface by chance. At the core there is a potential of music that unfolds, but on the surface everything is left to itself to some extent. And yes, it is true that sometimes something like that can happen in a garden.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003e\u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/Landscape_3_Tirano_480x480.jpg?v=1751486073\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; float: none;\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Another Timbre","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51429009981754,"sku":"at200","price":10.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/at200frontcover.jpg?v=1749648637"},{"product_id":"jurg-frey-string-trio-apartment-house","title":"Jürg Frey","description":"\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eString Trio\u003c\/strong\u003e (2017\/2018\/2022)    51:00\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eMira Benjamin, violin   \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eBridget Carey, viola   \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003eAnton Lukoszevieze, cello\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/Jurg_Frey_480x480.jpg?v=1751464755\" alt=\"\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; float: none;\"\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\n\u003ch2 class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003eInterview with Jürg Frey\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C15\"\u003eCan you tell us the history of your String Trio?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eI wrote the piece on a commission from the Concertgebouw Brugge, and it was premiered by the Goeyvaerts Trio as part of the 2019 SLOW Festival. The trio played the piece again after the festival, but I always had the feeling that it hadn’t yet arrived at its final destination. So when the plan emerged to have Apartment House record the trio, I sat down again and worked some more on the piece.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eIt’s not the first time I’ve re-worked ‘finished’ pieces. This is mainly due to my basic way of working, which knows no compositional system, and the procedure is also unsystematic. This means that everything takes a long time. It’s a slow process of emergence, of omission, of developments. It feels like a slow but natural process which I can’t accelerate at will. And this process leads in the end to a clear, in itself calm architecture of the composition. A calmness that is not least connected with the fact that the compositional questions have now been clarified.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C8\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C15\"\u003eLike a lot of your music, the trio has a strong melancholic streak - especially the final minutes, which I find almost painfully sad. Are you particularly drawn to melancholy, or is the emotional effect of your music not something which you consider when you are composing and working out how a piece should develop?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eI am always very much concerned with questions of material when I compose. And I think one of the reasons for my preoccupation with material is that it allows me to develop a kind of resistance to slipping too easily into a melancholic streak. I don’t resist it in an uptight way, but I try to look at the material as a neutral thing, and then under the surface it acquires those colours that characterise my music.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C20\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C15\"\u003eDoes the trio have any tonal or modal centre? To my ears all the notes sound so ‘right’ that I can hardly believe that you’re not using some kind of system.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eIf ‘system’ means making systematic preparations and developing a system before composing that can serve as a guideline in the work, then no, there is no system. It’s more an empirical procedure. For example, I had the idea that the piece should begin with a repeated note in the cello over a period of time. But the fact that this low ‘E’ in the cello then sounds on and on for almost nine minutes was no system-related idea; it simply emerged from the work.  Of course, I found it thrilling during this work when I realised that it became possible to leave the cello on the ‘E’ for so long.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eAnd then arise questions of architecture, emotionality, energies, context and dimensions in a piece. All this makes the work process so exciting and lively. So at the end of the repetitions the cello descends two notes, and this motif then becomes the material for the continuation, and later comes this short motif with the fast notes. It’s hard to describe this as a system. But it would also be too easy for me to say ‘you just have to make the right decisions at the right place in the piece’. For me it’s mainly a matter of the ear, of listening, and a matter of feeling, to figure out how things go together. And here it’s obvious that this long ‘E’ in the cello, and later the ‘C#’ in the cello, become an influence on the tonal atmosphere through the whole piece.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C20\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C15\"\u003eFor what it’s worth, I find the String Trio stunningly beautiful, and like it as much as anything you’ve written. Do you have favourite pieces of your own? Or is it impossible to think of your own creations in that sort of way?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eThe piece is also very special to me in that it’s the first time that I’ve listened to a piece again and again after finishing the editing. I should say that I’m used to listening to recordings of my own pieces, but never so often as with the String Trio. I don’t know why this happened, but one thing I hear in the piece: it’s a (maybe even perfect) balance between anonymity and personality. And that results in music that ultimately remains inexplicable even to me.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C15\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Another Timbre","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51429084037434,"sku":"at217","price":11.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/at217Freytriofrontcover.jpg?v=1749649660"},{"product_id":"catherine-lamb-kristofer-svensson","title":"Catherine Lamb \u0026 Kristofer Svensson","description":"\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C11\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eCatherine Lamb \u003c\/strong\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003e‘Prisma Interius VIII’  (Melodic Duo)  (2018)        22:26\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C11\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eKristofer Svensson\u003c\/strong\u003e   \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C9\"\u003e‘Vid stenmuren blir tanken blomma’  (2018)     40:13\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C10\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003ePlayed by\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003eandPlay\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e-  Maya Bennardo, violin  and Hannah Levinson, viola\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/kristofer_svensson_480x480.jpg?v=1751464292\" alt=\"\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; float: none;\"\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\n\u003ch2 class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C16\"\u003eInterview with Kristofer Svensson\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C\"\u003eI guess a lot of people won’t have heard of you, so could you tell us a bit about yourself and your musical background?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C1\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eI am a composer and musician living in Sollentuna – a northern district of greater Stockholm. I write both fully notated compositions for classical\/new-music musicians as well as open scores for improvising musicians. An example of the former is found on this album with andPlay – the occasion for this conversation. An example of the latter is the recording of the score \"Av hav\" that can be found on last year's album \"two skies\" with Maya Bennardo, Erik Blennow Calälv, and myself; the more open\/improvisatory pieces are typically performed in settings in which I play the kacapi. I also have a handful of compositions that exist in between these poles of fully notated and improvised music.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eIn terms of my musical training, I have a background of practicing shakuhachi performance in the kinko-ryū school, studying jazz and Western classical music as a young bass player in Stockholm, learning the guqin in the Rong Family Tradition with Hammond Yung in Hong Kong, and studying Sundanese karawitan (primarily gamelan and tembang sunda cianjuran) in West Java with Dody Satya Ekagustiman and Ade Suparman. I love all of these traditions and had formative experiences from the periods I was immersed in each of them, but I do not identify as coming from or belonging to any one tradition more than any other. My primary interest was always to try to bring about experiences that I hadn't had with sound before, which is why I eventually turned to developing my composition and improvisation practice. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C\"\u003eWhat about ’Vid stenmuren blir tanken blomma’ – your long piece on the Translucent Harmonies album? How did that come about, and what does the title mean?  Also, I understand that it uses Just Intonation, which, to be honest, I’d never have guessed as – to my layperson’s ears - it doesn’t sound like other JI pieces. Do all or most of your more notated compositions use JI, and if so, why?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C2\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003eThe piece was commissioned by andPlay and they premiered it in 2018 as part of their concert-length program \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C2\"\u003eTranslucent Harmonies\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003e which also included the duo version of Catherine Lamb’s \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C2\"\u003ePrisma Interius VIII  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C0\"\u003e– as on the CD.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003eThe piece’s title roughly translates as ‘By the stone wall, thoughts become flower’. I suppose that the function of the title is quite conventional: it uses words to help attune the listener to the non-verbal world of the piece. What is very unusual for me with this title is the word ‘become’ which implies transformation and change, but is something that I think is essential to what I wanted to explore. In this piece, there are many sudden non-expressive contrasts, surprises, modulations, and transformations. For me, the image of thoughts, or mind, becoming flower points to what I experience to be – for lack of better words – the religious nature of these juxtapositions: they enable a dynamic encounter with the ground of awareness from which different sounds are enacted – a sudden insight into the nonduality of mind and matter, experience and experiencer. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003eAll my compositions – save for very few exceptions – use JI, and my improvisatory practice is also in JI. The question of why this piece in particular doesn’t “sound” like other JI music can be answered in a couple of ways. The first answer has simply to do with the fact that this piece is in 5-limit JI. You’re probably familiar with the idea that prime numbers greatly influence the sound of JI. While the primes 7, 11, and 13 generate interval sizes that sound different from Western European music, 5 (and 3 which it encompasses) generate interval sizes that, in their simplest form, do not sound radically ‘unusual’ to a musician trained in Western European music. My hope and belief, however, is that you would have said the exact same thing even of my pieces that are in 7, 11, and 13-limit JI. I typically, even in 13-limit pieces, work with simple intervals and do not generally explore the more thorny, ‘microtonal’ sounds that can be generated with JI. I work modally –building scales and modes by combining different simple ratios – rather than chromatically or microtonally. I then express these modes through rather strict contrapuntal constraints in order to ensure an idiomatic balance between directly and indirectly tunable intervals – i.e. to ensure performability – which for the listeners creates a situation where the intonation stays in the background: what I am interested in is the attunemental flavour of musical modes and the affective qualia of pitches as they are perfumed by the mode, not drawing attention to the intonation or microtonal profiles of pitches. Lastly, many composers are more interested in exploring the intervals generated by 7-limit and higher, so most “JI-composer’s” music does not have the sound of 5-limit JI. This generalization also applies to my own practice as most of my works are in 11-limit or higher.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-_Web_-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-_Web_-C-C1\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003eThat’s interesting. Some JI compositions don’t really work for me as they sound like mathematical exercises, whereas your piece has a playfulness and unpredictability which I find very engaging. Did Maya and Hannah from andPlay find it relatively easy to take on your piece, or did its ‘surprising’ elements create problems for them? And how did you meet the duo?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003eWhile the piece is written to be light, unpredictable, and playful, this playfulness is situated in a quite placid scenery. There is a calmness and quietness that the playfulness arises out of and returns to. You are right that it is exactly the addition of playfulness, not the placidity, that makes it a challenging piece. In terms of ensuring a good performance out of a score, I have experienced with performances of my music that it is much less of a risk to write a piece that is solely calm and serene. The intricate rhythms, swift tempo changes, surprising turns, and pointillistic phrases of this score can only be brought to a state of playful lightness and buoyancy by dedicated performers who work closely together to carefully sculpt each phrase and tone–relating them to both local musical energies as well as the entire form of the piece. After first meeting Maya at a festival in the U.S. in 2015 where a piece of mine was being performed, I was asked to write a short piece for andPlay, so I knew from working with them that Maya and Hannah are excellent chamber music performers and incredibly synchronized and attuned to each other. It is because of their qualities that I was inspired to write this kind of challenging work. It is not an easy piece, but I knew they would enjoy the process required and that it would capture andPlay’s strengths.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003eGoing back to your first answer, could you say a bit more about your more improvisatory \/ open pieces? What is a kapaci, and why do you use it in improvisatory contexts?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003eThe kacapi is as central to the traditional music of West Java as the piano is to European Classical music, so it was an instrument I learned as part of the process of studying Sundanese music. Because of its zither form with twenty easily retunable strings over four octaves, the kacapi also became a helpful tool for exploring new tunings and compositional ideas. Many of my compositions, such as \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C20\"\u003eSå vill jag glömma \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003efor solo violin and \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C20\"\u003eSom morgonånga betraktad\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003e for bass koto grew out of working at the kacapi. I soon found that I did not need to solidify this practice into fully notated compositions but that it was stimulating enough to improvise rather freely in these new kacapi tunings. I started inviting musicians to improvise in these tunings with me, and I have since found it to be a very rich way of creating music relationally. These improvisatory pieces spell out the JI mode in use and the different tunable paths one can take through it. In that regard, I bring the same care for tunability and contrapuntal constraints that characterize my written compositions to the improvised music–but treated more freely. Some scores give more directions than others–such as characteristic phrases and motives, depending on the tunings involved. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003eI confess that yours was a new name to me when this project was submitted, but I’ve since bought the ‘two skies’ album that you mentioned above, and am keen to hear more. What other music of yours is available, and what are you currently working on?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003eThere are two quite recent releases by fantastic musicians that I especially would love for new listeners to discover. The first is Miyami McQueen-Tokita and Takashi Sugawa’s recording of my short bass koto and cello duo ‘Av dag och fattigdom’, which appeared on Miyama’s 2020 album ‘Sonobe’ on Namboku Records. Their performance of this brief, austere piece is very moving to me. The second is Mats Persson’s beautiful recording of my half-hour-long clavichord piece ‘I Sommarluft’, released on the 2022 album ‘Stilla sväva’ on kuyin.  Mats has been an essential part of the scene for new music in Sweden since the 1970’s - being a real champion for strands other than mainstream modernism and minimalism - and he was the first musician to support and perform my music. Writing this piece for him, and collaborating on it, was a real highlight of recent years.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003eI’m currently working on a few different chamber pieces. In particular I’ve been spending a lot of time working at the spinet harpsichord recently. A big piece for 13-limit tuned keyboard, ‘Som regn’, that I worked on for many years just premiered at the Sixth Edition Festival for Other Music in Stockholm, and now I’m developing some new tunings for the instrument - among other things completing a long duo for harpsichord and violin. I’m also spending a lot of time with the kacapi this fall; improvising with friends and also working on a long solo piece called ‘Kacapiblomster’, which I’m going to perform a few times this fall in Sweden, Germany and Indonesia. I hope to record it sometime in the upcoming years as the follow-up to my 2020 kacapi solo album ‘Andra Segel’.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003e\u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/9_copy.jpg?v=1751464502\" alt=\"\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003eandPlay:  Hannah Levinson (viola)   \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C18\"\u003eMaya Bennardo (violin)\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Another Timbre","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51429090001210,"sku":"at218","price":6.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/at218frontcover.jpg?v=1749649709"},{"product_id":"jurg-frey-outermost-melodies-ian-antonio","title":"Jürg Frey","description":"\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eDisc One\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C11\"\u003e1  \u003cstrong\u003eGlafsered I\u003c\/strong\u003e  (2002)     13:55\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C11\"\u003e2-5  \u003cstrong\u003eGewicht, Luft, Farbe\u003c\/strong\u003e   (2014\/2015)    37:41\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C11\"\u003e6  \u003cstrong\u003eToucher l’air  \u003c\/strong\u003e (2019)     27:49        played by Talujon percussion ensemble\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003eDisc Two\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C12\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C13\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C14\"\u003e1-4  \u003cstrong\u003eTender Outermost Melodies\u003c\/strong\u003e   (2022)     21:48\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C14\"\u003e5   \u003cstrong\u003eDie meisten Sachen macht man selten\u003c\/strong\u003e   (1994\/1997)    10:12\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C14\"\u003e6  \u003cstrong\u003e Jemandem bei einer Tätigkeit zuhören\u003c\/strong\u003e    (1997)    12:07\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C14\"\u003e7   \u003cstrong\u003eMetal, Stone\u003c\/strong\u003e    (2003)      32:06\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/Ju-rg_Frey_FOTO_3_zvg_480x480.jpg?v=1751459678\" alt=\"\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; float: none;\"\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003ch2 class=\"Wp-Normal-P\" style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C6\"\u003eInterview with Ian Antonio\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eCould you tell us something about your own background as a musician?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003eI grew up in a musical family in upstate New York just outside of the state capital, Albany. My mother taught elementary school music and my father was a band director in the city school district. Perhaps most consequentially, my father is also a percussionist, so it seemed perfectly normal that we had drums, xylophones, marimbas, and all manner of other instruments around the house. There was constant traffic of percussion students coming in and out, too, and I've been told I would watch the lessons through the small window in the back door while my father taught. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003eI was drawn to classical music fairly early, and unlike a lot of percussionists, I only learned to play drumset much later on. I played in the local youth orchestra and percussion ensemble and went to college with the dream of someday joining an orchestra. While studying in New York City, I ended up becoming friends with composers, jazz musicians, and other artists who were more interested in new and experimental music, and I found myself drawn to that world and the sounds in it. While I still enjoy the classics of the repertoire, I've been pretty immersed in the world of contemporary music for the past several decades.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"List-Paragraph-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"List-Paragraph-C\"\u003eAm I right that you also play – or played - with both Wet Ink and Yarn\/Wire, two of the most highly-rated groups for contemporary music in the USA?  I imagine that was exhilarating and exhausting in equal measure. Could you tell us a bit more about that side of things? \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"List-Paragraph-C-C0\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003eAbsolutely. The four ensembles I’ve been most closely associated with are Wet Ink, Yarn\/Wire, Talujon, and Zs. I presently play with and co-direct Wet Ink – a composer \/ performer collective, and Talujon – a percussion ensemble. Yarn\/Wire is a piano percussion quartet, still very active, that I co-founded in 2005 and performed with until 2020. Zs is a band that I played with from 2003-2012. And then there is a host of other performing ensembles that I formerly played with frequently: Theatre of a Two-headed Calf, International Contemporary Ensemble, SEM Ensemble, Talea Ensemble, and many more. These are all groups in the New York City contemporary music, or slightly adjacent, ecosystem, and you’re correct – both an exhilarating and sometimes exhausting lifestyle. There were stretches of time where I learned over 100 new pieces of music each year and juggled a performance calendar that barely accommodated practice much less a personal\/interior life. But I wouldn’t trade that time for anything. My own personal aesthetics have been so thoroughly influenced by my friends and colleagues in these groups that I can’t imagine what I would be doing today without spending so much time in rehearsal, on the road, and in performance.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003eNow that I have a more full-time academic role and two younger daughters, my performance calendar is far less dense. Because of this space, I’ve found I need to truly interrogate what directions to pursue by myself. This album of Jürg’s music is one of the first truly personal projects I’ve worked on in years.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eWhen and how did you discover Jürg's music, and what drew you to it?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003eThe first time I heard Jürg's music was on Soundcloud. I can't remember when, maybe about 15 years ago, but the algorithm would always send me from whatever I was listening to the same Jürg Frey piece which I loved. I can't recall what it was now, maybe Circular Music No. 2, but I do remember that I wouldn't notice the piece starting but then realize I was in fact listening to it closely. The stillness and closeness and warmth were somewhat new to me at that point in my life. At that time I was playing a lot of very loud and often very fast music and this was something very much the opposite. That said, I didn't start to play any of Jürg's music until more recently. It might have been a product of a geographic\/professional shift, the pandemic, or maybe just evolving interests, but the past few years have just felt like the right time for me to work on Jürg's music as a performer. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C17\"\u003eSeveral of the pieces on the album were written over twenty years ago. Do you feel there's a difference between pieces such as 'Glafsered I', 'Die meisten Sachen...', 'Metal, Stone' and 'Jemandem bei einer Taglichkeit...' and the more recent pieces?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003eI have the pieces arranged by date in the music reading application on my ipad, so I suppose I've always been thinking of them on a sort of chronological and stylistic continuum. The earliest pieces I played, 'Jemandem bei einer Taglichkeit...' and 'Die meisten Sachen...' seem to be somewhat \"operational\" in that a system is set up and then put in motion. Or at least that is how I approached their performance. The pivot, in my mind, is in 'Glafsered 1' and 'Metal, Stone', where there is a bit more vertical orientation and perhaps a more expressive edge to the pieces. I feel this is especially true in 'Glafsered 1', which was the first of these pieces I worked on and performed. Both 'Gewicht, Luft, Farbe' and 'Tender Outermost Melodies' seem even more evocative to me. Perhaps because they are \"bigger\" pieces and cover more timbral ground, but also in the way they use space and, in the case of 'Gewicht, Luft, Farbe', a very clear and rare use of harmony in this collection of percussive pieces.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"List-Paragraph-P\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"List-Paragraph-C\"\u003eYes, I think that’s right, that the recent works are more expressive, and that ‘Glafsered I’ and ‘Metal, Stone’ are pivots in this gradual stylistic shift in Jürg's music.  If you were used to playing much louder and faster music, I suppose this is quite a change, but is there a kind of ‘virtuosity of restraint’ (to use John Tilbury’s phrase) in playing music like Jürg’s?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"Wp-Normal-P\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"Normal-C-C19\"\u003eI do like the phrase ‘virtuosity of restraint’ but I’m not sure I ever thought about restraint as a feature of the performance of Jürg’s music. Perhaps the pieces sound restrained, but as a performer I am primarily concerned with accurately representing what Jürg wrote. Everything is right there on the page – tempos, rests, dynamics, articulations, and each individual note. Jürg does not use repeat signs, even when it would certainly save time in the notation process. So I feel like the challenge in performing the music of this album is to properly execute the figures and gestures that develop in the practice of each piece. For example, the opening passage of ‘Metal, Stone’ is not traditionally difficult but the transparency of the music raises the stakes dramatically, or at least in my performer’s mind. Is my time consistent? Are the different instruments speaking at a more-or-less uniform dynamic even though the distances between them and the metal compositions and resonances of each instrument are slightly different? I suppose there is just very little between the making of each sound and the listener, and that is where any virtuosity might emerge.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/dsc_8486_480x480.jpg?v=1751459721\" alt=\"\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; float: none;\"\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003eIan Antonio\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Another Timbre","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51429114904890,"sku":"at226x2","price":16.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/at226x2JurgFreyOutermostMelodies.jpg?v=1749650019"},{"product_id":"jurg-frey-longing-landscape-prague-quiet-music-collective","title":"Jürg Frey","description":"\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e1.  \u003cstrong\u003eThe sound never has walls    \u003c\/strong\u003e(2023\/2024)        19:42\u003cbr\u003eRenata Raková, clarinet   Ian Mikyska, electric guitar\u003cbr\u003eMilan Kárník Jakeš, violin   Luan Gonçalves, double bass\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e2.  \u003cstrong\u003eFleetingness     \u003c\/strong\u003e(2024)      12:33\u003cbr\u003easamisimasa:  Morten Barrikmo, bass clarinet    Tanja Orning, cello Anders Førisdal, electric guitar    Håkon Stene, percussion\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003ePrague Quiet Music Collective:  Renata Raková, clarinet   Ian Mikyska, electric guitar Milan Kárník Jakeš, violin   Luan Gonçalves, double bass\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e3.  \u003cstrong\u003eLonging Landscape    \u003c\/strong\u003e(2022\/2023)       35:57      \u003cbr\u003eAnna Paulová, bass clarinet   Ian Mikyska, electric guitar Milan Kárník Jakeš, violin    Luan Gonçalves, double bass\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cimg style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; float: none;\" alt=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/Ju-rg_Frey_1_300dpi_480x480.jpg?v=1751281904\"\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003ch2 style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003eInterview with Ian Mikyska of the Prague Quiet Music Ensemble\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cem\u003eFirst could you tell us about the Prague Quiet Music Collective. When was it set up, and what exactly were its aims?\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWe started the ensemble in 2021. At that point, I'd been increasingly involved with the world of reductionism \/ post-minimalism \/ post-Cage \/ post-Feldman \/ Wandelweiser etc. for some time, and I'd also been back in Prague for a few years. I'd been working with Milan Jakeš (violin) and Luan Gonçalves (double bass) for years. They're both musicians who feel at home in jazz, free improvisation, contemporary and experimental music... Most importantly, though, they were also the ones who responded with the most excitement when I gave them some of my favourite albums to listen to: Jürg Frey's \u003cem\u003eGrizzana\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eCircles and Landscapes, \u003c\/em\u003eand \u003cem\u003eCollection Gustave Roud \u003c\/em\u003e(all on Another Timbre), Eva-Maria Houben's music, and the like – I remember Luan was in the hospital for an operation and I sent him Michael Pisaro's album\u003cem\u003e asleep, street, pipes, tones\u003c\/em\u003e, and the reply I got back a day later made it clear that listening to it at night in a virtually empty hospital was quite an experience. (That version is by Kristine Tjøgersen and Håkon Stene and it's one of my all-time favourite albums, so it's kind of surreal for me that Håkon is playing with us on this new Another Timbre release!) The fourth member to join the ensemble was Anna Paulová, a true clarinet star (think Mozart concerto soloist) but also an extremely open and curious artist who's genuinely just as happy riding with us in a packed car to play four notes in the space of an hour in an empty factory near Opava as she is being the star soloist in Europe's gilded halls.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHowever, the fifth and absolutely most crucial member of the ensemble is Nikola Štefková, our manager \/ executive director \/ fundraiser \/ PR manager – the heart and soul of the ensemble. I met Nikola when she was a producer at Czech Radio, and after she left, I approached her about producing a sixth-tone harmonium project that was only a vague plan at the time. She ended up securing such amazing funding that I decided to push my luck and suggest that we also use this money to start an ensemble. I remember how nervous I was before that meeting, because it involved turning an 18-month project into a permanent venture. It turned out that this was (and remains) Nikola's favourite music, with her favourite composer being Eva-Maria Houben, so I really needn't have worried.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSince then, the goal has remained the same: to present this music, which rarely gets enough airtime, to commission new pieces by composers working in this style, as well as occasional commissions to composers who \u003cem\u003edon't\u003c\/em\u003e, as a kind of open invitation to try working in this direction. We've also tried to present our music in curated programmes with an emphasis on the concert situation, frequently incorporating lighting, stage design, collaborations with other artists, and so on. Every year we present three programmes that we produce ourselves (one of them being the Prague Quiet Music Festival, the others have included exhibitions, spoken word and music concerts, outdoor concerts, staged concerts) as well as performing at other events (mostly in the Czech Republic and Slovakia, though we're also doing some shows in Poland and Scandinavia in 2025).\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eHow did PQMC come to commission pieces from Jürg, and how have you found working with him?\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI think the fact that our group has such a clear and outspoken focus on this kind of repertoire, rather than it being one of the kinds of music we play, is one of the reasons we've been so well received in the community. On the very first batch of commissions we did in 2021, we had Eva-Maria Houben, James Weeks, Linda Catlin Smith and Fredrik Rasten. Since then, we've been able to commission composers including Klaus Lang, Jack Langdon, Sylvia Lim, Matej Sloboda, Ferdinand Schwarz and many others.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWe knew we wanted to work with Jürg, of course. We got in touch more or less as soon as it made sense, but Jürg was already busy with commissions at the time, so our first collaboration – \u003cem\u003eLonging Landscape\u003c\/em\u003e – had to wait until 2023. I guess Jürg was happy with how things went when he came to Prague for our festival in 2023, because he then went on to write us another two pieces, one of them for a larger ensemble of eight people. These are the three pieces on this album.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eRehearsing with Jürg is something really special. In rehearsal, composers can frustrate musicians by either having an idea that's too clear or not clear enough. Jürg has a way of doing neither: of not really talking that much about \u003cem\u003ehow \u003c\/em\u003ewe're playing the piece, but rather of what the piece is about; what he imagined the piece could do and be... All this happens in quite abstract terms, and yet at the end, you feel like you've understood something and your being inside the piece starts to make more sense. That being said, when Jürg was specific about how he wanted us to do something, it was often not what you'd expect – I remember a lot of phrases like \"faster and louder\", \"swinging, like jazz\", \"more in tempo, with a clear pulse\", and so on.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThat last part also points to something else: the fact that Jürg is neither writing the music he used to write nor writing the music that anyone expects of him. Jürg also performed a solo set at that year's festival, which featured a lot of really radical pieces from the 1990s. Then there's the more \"Romantic\" side (heard on the albums I mentioned in my previous response) and the circular music pieces, but the compositions he's been writing in the last few years (including \u003cem\u003eLonging Landscape \u003c\/em\u003eand the other ones on this album) work very differently on a formal level, particularly concerning memory, time, and phrases.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThat’s very interesting. Could you say more about how you see this new phase in Jürg’s work, and a little about each of the pieces on the album?\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI was worried you’d ask me that – now I’ve written myself into a corner!\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOne thing to consider is the selection of pitches, which seem to live in a strange borderland between consonance and dissonance – as soon as you feel you’ve settled in to a familiar tonal landscape,  there are new notes shifting you elsewhere. And it really feels like there’s motion, too, not just an extended modal palette – it’s like tonal music that doesn’t quite go anywhere.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI’m mostly talking about the middle section of \u003cem\u003eLonging Landscape\u003c\/em\u003e. It starts around 8 minutes into the piece and is by far the longest, running all the way to the 25-minute mark. It’s based on a slow 13-bar loop. First, the guitar plays its 13 bars of material. Then, the violin joins (with different material), then the bass clarinet and double bass (likewise). Then the double bass switches to a different 13-bar phrase, then the bass clarinet, then the violin, and finally the guitar. The loop is too long and too complex to really be perceived consciously (unless you’ve been primed by reading this paragraph before you listen, I suppose), but it certainly has a perceptual effect; a slow, gradual realisation. It’s similar to what happens with musical memory in some of the long Feldman pieces like \u003cem\u003ePiano and String Quartet\u003c\/em\u003e, but even more stretched out and with a lot more tonal variety, so you feel this palpable gap between your sensuous perception of the music, which mostly goes by very slowly, and the intellectual or conscious appreciation of it that begins emerging gradually. In Feldman, these two elements seem a lot more unified; here, there’s a pleasant tension.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eParts A and C of \u003cem\u003eLonging Landscape\u003c\/em\u003e, which begin and conclude the piece, work on the principle of the “list”: each instrument is presented with a set of vertically ordered materials that they can play at any time, but they must be played in order, in tempo, and without repetitions. As a player, you are simply asked to listen to the situation and place the sounds in time (you also have a choice of tempo and, therefore, duration). There is also a very slow melody running along this “list” material, a kind of\u003cem\u003e cantus firmus\u003c\/em\u003e, which is played by all 4 instruments in turn in section A and by a guitar with e-bow in section C. The interpretation of the list in these sections is also a lot to do with pacing; being aware of where everyone else is in their lists and melodies.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAll of the above is also true of \u003cem\u003eThe sound never has walls \u003c\/em\u003e– \u003cem\u003eLonging Landscape \u003c\/em\u003ewas the first of these pieces, and \u003cem\u003eThe sound never has walls \u003c\/em\u003efeels like a distillation of this “list” idea in a sense, as well as adding new possibilities of interaction, allowing the musicians to operate in between the list and any additions to the melody (played by the guitar) as they see fit.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eFleetingness\u003c\/em\u003e was written specifically with the combined forces of PQMC and asamisimasa in mind, and it’s a kind of large-scale version of the “list” idea – while the lists in the previous two pieces generally consists of one or two notes, here, it is the page that serves as the basic unit of music. The score is composed of seven pages, each of which can be played by any instrument and repeated (except page IV). What results is a larger and freer playing field, though still emphasising one’s responsibility to the others and containing something of the lopsided tonality that I talked about in\u003cem\u003e Longing Landscape\u003c\/em\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Another Timbre","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51429153767738,"sku":"at232","price":10.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/at232frontcover.jpg?v=1749650411"},{"product_id":"jurg-frey","title":"Jürg Frey","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003eJe laisse à la nuit son poids d’ombre\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003e   (2019\/2020)    52:07\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003eensemble]h[iatus \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-family: Tahoma, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt;\"\u003eMartine Altenburger\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan style=\"mso-spacerun: yes;\"\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003ci style=\"font-family: Tahoma, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt;\"\u003ecello      \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-family: Tahoma, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt;\"\u003eTiziana Bertoncini\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan style=\"mso-spacerun: yes;\"\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003ci style=\"font-family: Tahoma, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt;\"\u003eviolin      \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-family: Tahoma, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt;\"\u003eFabrice Charles \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan style=\"mso-spacerun: yes;\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003ci style=\"font-family: Tahoma, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt;\"\u003etrombone\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-font-kerning: 0pt; mso-ligatures: none; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003eIsabelle Duthoit \u003ci\u003e\u003cspan style=\"mso-spacerun: yes;\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003eclarinet      \u003c\/i\u003eLaurent Guitton \u003cspan style=\"mso-spacerun: yes;\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003ci\u003etuba      \u003c\/i\u003eLê Quan Ninh \u003cspan style=\"mso-spacerun: yes;\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003ci\u003epercussion\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eHélène Fauchère\u003ci\u003e \u0026amp; \u003c\/i\u003eGéraldine Keller\u003ci\u003e  voice\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-font-kerning: 0pt; mso-ligatures: none; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003c\/i\u003eThomas Lehn \u003cspan style=\"mso-spacerun: yes;\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003ci\u003eanalogue synthesiser      \u003c\/i\u003eAlessandra Rombolá \u003cspan style=\"mso-spacerun: yes;\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003ci\u003eflute \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-font-kerning: 0pt; mso-ligatures: none; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; color: black; mso-color-alt: windowtext; mso-font-kerning: 0pt; mso-ligatures: none; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/Ju-rg_Frey_FOTO_3_zvg_5e0e70d3-72e5-4fa5-9f8f-8ec4d68f2b98_480x480.jpg?v=1762183499\" alt=\"\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; float: none;\"\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003ch2 style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;\"\u003eInterview with Jürg Frey \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003e‘Je laisse à la nuit son poids d’ombre’ is written for a relatively large ensemble of 10 players, including two female voices, trombone, tuba and analogue synthesiser. I’m guessing it’s the first time that you’ve composed for this combination of instruments. I think it’s beautifully atmospheric music, but was there anything about the instrumentation that you found challenging?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eIn fact, the instrumentation was not easy to handle, and there were two sticking points that particularly challenged me: firstly, it was the analogue synthesiser, and above all the way Thomas Lehn plays this instrument. He has a very individual approach to playing the instrument, and this approach is also strongly influenced by his work as an improvising musician. I really appreciated that Thomas took the time to come from Vienna to Aarau and to work with me; it helped hugely and that's how I learned about the instrument. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eThe second, even greater challenge was the two soprano voices. It really took me many weeks to figure out how I wanted to deal with the two voices and how the two voices relate to each other. At the beginning, the whole spectrum of possibilities was open: the two voices are opposed to each other, and so there is some kind of drama, or, on the other hand, the two voices merge together and sing in unison the whole time.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eIn addition to these two questions, which concerned a specific instrumental-technical issue on the one hand and a fundamental conceptual issue concerning the two voices on the other, there was another component that indirectly affected the instrumentation: When writing for an ensemble such as ensemble]h[iatus, which has a deeply rooted experience in improvisation, one writes not only for instruments, but also, to a particular extent, for the personalities of the musicians. I knew some of the musicians, I had already worked with some of them, and I had to find out information about the others. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eWhat did you discover while composing the piece?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eI don't think I discover much while composing. Or maybe in a more general way: I discover the piece. My composing is primarily a process of doing something, even when it doesn't seem like the piece is progressing. I am doing something; even thinking about it is doing something, or reading a book. Many decisions are intuitive, with a precise sense of what the piece will be. I feel that it could be right. When the piece is written I discover more and more things that are connected on different levels, even things that I wasn't fully aware of while working. Things that I didn't “compose” but simply ‘did’, writing notes.... And discovering all these connections and relationships means discovering what the piece is, what kind of ‘body’ the piece is, beyond “simply writing the notes”. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eThe piece uses various texts – a mixture of old Japanese haikus and poems by Swiss poet Anne Perrier (1922-2017), who I understand was part of the vibrant literary scene in the “Romandie”, the French-speaking part of Switzerland.\u003cspan style=\"mso-spacerun: yes;\"\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003eWhat drew you to these particular texts?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eThe selection of texts began with the poems of Anne Perrier, a poetic work that I have known for years but never had the opportunity to combine with music. And soon the two soprano voices issue returned: can Anne Perrier speak or sing with two voices? And then, after many attempts, the answer was: no.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eI then decided to juxtapose Anne Perrier's poems with a selection of Japanese haikus. And when I had the selection on my desk, this inner vibration occurred, which subtly influenced the composition.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoListParagraph\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eTo me several of the texts seem to be about moments when things are hovering between two worlds, and that sense of uncertainty and fragility translates well into the music. Is that how you see the piece too?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eI agree, you can see that it is already prepared in the two worlds of Haikus and Anne Perrier.\u003cspan style=\"mso-spacerun: yes;\"\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003eAnd then, when composing, it is always important for me not only to create a secure architecture in the piece, but also to compose in the opposite direction: uncertainty, fragility... everything that subversively runs counter to stability, opens up to another world. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eThrough my choice of text, I also approached this sense of uncertainty and fragility, much is only hinted at, but at the same time it is very precise – exactly my world. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eAnd the music might also feel in suspension, partly because there is no bass voice to ground the composition. This ground world may then partly be reflected by the ensemble, tuba, trombone, low drums. And last but not least, the fragility arises from some open sections in the composition. It is the moment when, as a composer, I communicate with the musicians in a special way: not that I give them the freedom to improvise, but the decisions lie in their hands, that is, in their ears and imagination, and ultimately in their hearts. The musicians leave the safe ground of the written composition, moving in limbo, connected to the ensemble and to the guidelines of the composition. I then have the feeling that they are hanging around in the ensemble and in the piece, rather than actively shaping it. They become responsible for the atmosphere, the tangibility and the gentle flow of energies of the composition. So they are actually playing in an uncertain landscape.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/stacks-image-16b6937-1200x422-1.jpg?v=1762183650\" alt=\"\"\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 15.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eInterview with Lê Quan Ninh of ensemble]h[iatus\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\" style=\"mso-hyphenate: none;\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eTell us a bit about ensemble]h[iatus: why and when did you set it up, and what are the aims of the group?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eThe ensemble was created by Martine Altenburger and myself in 2006, and our aim was to bring together musicians who were both performers and improvisers. We wanted to explore the hiatus between interpreting and improvising, hence the name given to the ensemble. Since its inception, we have performed new pièces by Vinko Globokar, Jean-Christophe Feldhandler, Peter Jakober, Steffen Krebber, Antony Pateras, Jennifer Walshe, Marco Döttlinger, Alexander Martinz, in addition to pieces from the contemporary repertoire. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\" style=\"mso-hyphenate: none;\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eAs I understand it, ‘Je laisse à la nuit son poids d’ombre’ was initiated by the ensemble rather than Jürg.\u003cspan style=\"mso-spacerun: yes;\"\u003e  \u003c\/span\u003eCan you explain how it came about?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Tahoma',sans-serif;\"\u003eYes, as a registered organisation in France, we were able to secure funding for a project. But it was my meeting with singer Hélène Fauchère, rather than Jürg, that initially sparked the idea. Hélène and I discussed composers we both liked, and two names came up: Beat Furrer and Jürg Frey, with whom Hélène had already worked. So the idea of commissioning a work from Jürg came about naturally. As an ensemble we had already explored rather turbulent aesthetics with pieces by Vinko Globokar and Peter Jakober, for example, but we also have a keen interest in the music of the Wandelweiser collective, and the project with Jürg Frey gave us the opportunity to explore a musical aesthetic that we’d never fully tackled before. Moreover, as the group already had one singer, we were also curious about what would happen with the presence of a second singer. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Another Timbre","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":52073955295546,"sku":"at249","price":10.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0740\/3631\/4426\/files\/at249_front_cover_93c4a5f4-5b7b-4557-be3d-4b4948cf56e3.jpg?v=1762182984"}],"url":"https:\/\/www.anothertimbre.com\/collections\/special-offer-2.oembed","provider":"Another Timbre","version":"1.0","type":"link"}