Linda Catlin Smith
Drifter

Reviews

“The experiment is always about whether something will hold,” says Toronto-based US composer Linda Catlin Smith, whose music tests how sounds can be longer or shorter, thicker or thinner, higher or lower, more distant or more intimate. The results are beautiful: poised and thoughtful, never forced. Often the music is soft but tactile – Catlin Smith lets us sit with the texture of the sounds, like feeling fabric between the fingers. This album of chamber music from the past two decades follows last year’s Dirt Road, also on Another Timbre. Drifter features Montreal’s Quatuor Bozzini playing the lilting Gondola, the Turner-inspired Folkestone and the Piano Quintet with Philip Thomas in graceful form; members of the ensemble Apartment House bring lonely elegance to Cantilena for viola and vibraphone and to the lissom title track for piano and guitar.”
5-star review in The Guardian by Kate Molleson

"Anyone who caught Canadian composer Linda Catlin Smith’s Dirt Road, a composition for violin and percussion which came out on Another Timbre last year, got pulled in to a musical language that seamlessly mines the overlay of strident abstraction and lush lyricism. When label-head Simon Reynell subsequently found himself in conversation with three Canadians about in-depth portrait releases of their music, things exploded into a series of 10 releases accompanied by a book of essays and interviews with the composers. The series kicked off this spring with five initial releases including a stellar two CD set exploring the breadth of Smith’s music in more detail. The consummate performances of her music by members of the British ensemble Apartment House and the Canadian string quartet Bozzini Quartet makes this one particularly noteworthy.  

In an interview, Smith talks about how her thoughts about composition evolved, from experiments with 12-tone pitch methods and exploratory processes, to an approach that focuses on harmonic simplicity, orchestration and color. Smith explains, “I respond to the material at hand on a moment-by-moment basis during the course of the creation of the work. It is not improvisation — not just writing whatever comes into my head, it’s not ‘anything goes.’ It is a mode of working that calls for intense scrutiny, questioning, experimentation and a kind of ruthlessness in the process. This way of working – this system – is a combination of intuition and reflection, and most of all, listening.”  

That focus is amply displayed in this set, providing a striking portrait of the composer, with pieces for string quartet, solos for cello, piano and violin, and small ensemble pieces. Listening to “Ricercar” for solo cello, “Galanthus” for solo violin and “Poire” for solo piano, one hears how shadings of historical compositional languages are absorbed and distilled with an abstract lyricism and unhurried lines, which let the notes and phrases establish a commanding presence.

The duos, likewise, show a keen ear for the refinement of harmony and timbral juxtaposition. Intertwining viola and vibraphone on the opening “Cantelina,” revels in shifting harmonic counterpoint that plays off of the respective resonances of the instruments. The title piece, “Drifter,” for guitar and piano shows a masterful consideration of the congruencies of plucked strings, drawing out nuances of each instrument, particularly attack and decay, as the parts intertwine and overlap, accruing a potent spare beauty reminiscent of Gagku which Smith was exposed to when studying with Jo Kondo. The violin, percussion, piano trio “Moi Qui Tremblais” is also a standout, with dark shifting layers of extended quavering violin tones, waves of piano chords and deep, shimmering damped crashes that progresses with a tremulous momentum.  

Smith’s writing for string quartet is also amply featured, expertly performed by The Bozzini Quartet. “Gondola” shifts and sways along built from, in Smith’s words, “not-quite-unison melody — the slightly unraveled line — and quietly rocking chords” seamlessly moving in and out of lush tonality. The 32-minute “Folkestone” is a meditative study in the musical terrain of the string quartet, moving across 24 events, each a consideration of the unisons and countervailing voicings of the instruments with each respective miniature layering into the flow of the piece. There are beguiling moments where the quartet conjures up the reedy wheezings of an accordion. At other times, the overlapping harmonies amass into verdant scrims. “Piano Quintet” adds Philip Thomas piano in to the mix, and the layers become kaleidoscopic while always maintaining a staunch focus.  

Reynell muses on the series that “the idea of producing a Canadian series emerged, covering at first three, then five and finally ten CDs as I became more and more taken with and drawn to the richly diverse works being produced by musicians living in, or originating from a country that is so often eclipsed by its more powerful, populous and louder neighbor.” The result is a diverse set of music in both instrumentation and compositional approach. This entire first batch of the series is well worth investing time in, and on the basis of these, the next round should be another winner.”
Michael Rosenstein, Dusted