c'è in giro da tempo una nuova 'musica assoluta', astratta, che sta fra la cosiddetta 'ambient music' e la 'drone music', nei pressi dei cosiddetti 'soundscape' o, meglio ancora, degli 'innerscape' .. a volte ha tratti più 'cameristici', o addirittura per strumento solista, a volte è più 'sinfonica' .. a volte usa solo sonorità 'sintetiche', a volte invece anche strumenti 'tradizionali' .. ha antecedenti illustri, sia nella cosiddetta musica 'classica', diciamo storica, sia nella 'popular music' e nel jazz .. a quella soprattutto io guardo

https://www.facebook.com/notes/marco-lucchi/musica-assoluta/10155811583217624/

questo mese dedica speciale per Jonny Greenwwod

"musica assoluta" (agosto 2020)

MORE GOOD STUFF

Recent releases

holly

Release date: 27.05.2022

Martin Taxt – microtonal tuba, hand bells, composition
Rolf Erik Nystrøm – alto saxophone, hand bells
Laura Marie Rueslåtten – organ, hand bells
Inga Margrete Aas – double bass, hand bells
Peder Simonsen – microtonal tuba, hand bells, modular synthesizer

Second Room is Taxt’s second album in a series of works investigating possible relations between music and architecture. In this work written for alto saxophone, two microtonal tubas, double bass, church organ, hand bells and modular synthesizers he is inspired by the Japanese architect Sou Fujimoto, and his ideas on different concepts of living. 

In a lecture at the Harvard University in 2011, Fujimoto sets up a comparison between the nest and the cave, as two fundamentally different ways of living concepts. Whereas the nest represents safety, conformity and predictability, a space designed for people, the cave on the other side represents the unknown, a naturally shaped space, not designed for the purpose of living. It can be uncomfortable to enter the dark cave but spending time inside one can gradually start to adapt to the space. By rethinking our concept of space and the relation between space and human body we will eventually discover different functionalities within the cave and innovate new functions in the already designed space. 

(…)A grid system with 36 pitches was the starting point of the composing process. Imagining the grid as a cave, I made 3 different paths through the grid as if I was exploring the cave. These three melodies became the outline for this composition. On ‘Disruption, disjunction, deconstruction’ the musicians are exploring the 36 pitches independently, as if, quoting Fujimoto; finding their own small favourite comfortable places inside the natural cave(…)

Martin Taxt: disruption, disjunction, deconstruction from Second Room

Release date: 27.05.2022 (CD/DD) 05.08.2022 (LP)

In their new composition, Swagger, Oslo-based vocal duo Propan augment their customary sound palate with the aid of an eight-strong ensemble of strings, winds, percussion, voices, and electronics - an ensemble by the name Propanions. Combining pre-scored and improvised content, Swagger moves between the soft sound of tuning forks, odd beats, curious text, playful melodies and textural noise, resulting in an eccentric piece of definite character - an eclectic manifestation of the duo’s electroacoustic universe.

SWAGGER was commissioned in 2016 by Femme Brutal, a feminist booking and DJ collective. It received its world premiere at Oslo’s Parkteater, as part of the 2016 Femme Brutal Festival. The original score included choreographic movements performed live by musicians and a detailed lighting design.

Propan was founded in 2011 by vocalists Ina Sagstuen and Natali Abrahamsen Garner. They have toured widely throughout the world, including Japan, Australia, USA, Europe. Swagger is their fourth release, following Baby (Va Fongool 2016), Trending (SOFA 2019) and Loom (GLARC 2022).

Propan: B2 from Swagger

Title: mind is moving (IV)
Artist: Michael Francis Duch
SOFA 591 (2LP/DD)
Release date: 27.05.2022

mind is moving (IV)

Two monks were arguing about a flag. One said: "The flag is moving."
The other said: "The wind is moving."
The sixth patriarch happened to be passing by. He told them: "Not the wind, not the flag; mind is moving."

mind is moving (IV) is part of a series of pieces composed by Michael Pisaro-Liu. It is a collection of 60 sounds for the contrabass, and any performance may include anywhere from 30 to all 60 sounds in the score, that may be played in any order. There is one sound per minute and all are played pizzicato and generally soft. After playing the sound the performer should hold her/his position for as long as possible before playing the next sound, allowing the sound to ring as long as possible. 

The Koan that inspired the title of this series gives us an idea how to approach this piece, both as a listener as well as well as a performer. What are we listening to: The bass, the decay of the sounds played or the background noise?  Sound is moving and we are observing the process of the birth and death (decay) of each sound and, of course, the empty space between each sound event. In Zen this is referred to as Ma.

Although being an early piece by Pisaro-Liu (1996), it is seldom performed and has yet been recorded. This recording took place in the Nidaros cathedral in Trondheim in August 2019. As mentioned, the piece itself has no narrative as such, as the sounds can be played in any order and half of them may be omitted. Yet, the performer creates a narrative when interpreting and playing it. 
There is also another possible narrative here to be listened to. The piece was recorded in one take around midnight, and by default an hour of sound was documented from inside the cathedral, telling a parallel story of its own.

Michael F. Duch / Michael Pisaro: mind is moving (iv) excerpt

SOFA is proud to mark its 100th release with the stunningly beautiful double album Hereafter, a new major work from guitarist/composer Kim Myhr, written for the 15-piece Stavanger-based ensemble Kitchen Orchestra. 

“Hereafter can be seen as a meditation on mortality and transience”, Myhr explains. “It was written at a time where the prime minister of Norway told the country’s population that ‘you have to be prepared to lose someone dear to you’.  It was like taken out of Tarkovsky’s “Sacrifice”. This atmosphere set the tone for Hereafter, which was written in 2020. For me, this piece is about the acknowledging and acceptance of disaster”. 

During the months of composing the music, Myhr kept humming the song sung by Salamat Ali Khan in Satyajit Ray’s classic film “Jalsaghar”, in the scene where the son and wife of the main character dies in a storm. For Myhr, the song resonated with the mood of the moment and acted like an undercurrent for the making of Hereafter. “There is a haunting sadness to that song, but there’s also something very grounded about it. The way the singer looks straight at the protagonist. There is no escaping this. That was the feeling.”

Kim Myhr’s previous release “Sympathetic Magic” which was written the following year, was utopian and deliriously optimistic in character. In Hereafter, there is a strong gravitas, and the state of mind is centered.  “I think it’s one of my more eloquent and varied pieces. Even if the framework is grave, it goes through many different shades. And if the piece takes flight into more ecstatic territory, the music quickly retires back to more pensive ground”. The piece consists of two main parts, a bit like a morning and evening raga, where the first part is darker and second part is of a more uplifting character (the two sections are divided into smaller sections for listener’s convenience). 

Thus, sunrise and sunset, the sea and the shore, life and death, permeate the often-elegiac music on Hereafter, a stunning piece of music that ranks among Myhr’s best works yet. It is released as a gatefold double-LP, CD and DL, with a beautiful cover photo by Eleonore Huisse and art direction by Stephen O’Malley.

Kitchen Orchestra is a heterogenous ensemble based in Stavanger with musicians coming from different musical scenes, a perfect match for Kim Myhr’s music. The line-up includes drummers Ståle Birkeland and Dag Magnus Narvesen, Marius Munthe-Kaas on vibraphone, Øyvind Dale on organ and synthesizer, Johan Egdetveit on accordion, Signe Irene Time on vocals and cassette player, Dag Egil Njaa on laptop processing, two bass players John Lilja and Thomas Bang doubling on guitar as well as electric and double basses, string players Nils Erga and Jenni Witick, and horn players Arild Hoem, Petter Frost Fadnes, Gunhild Seim and Gaute Vikdal focusing primarily on the darker timbres with two baritone saxes, bass trombone and trumpet. Kim Myhr himself plays both 12- and 6-string electric guitars.

Bio 
Norwegian guitarist and composer Kim Myhr has been touring internationally since the early 2000s and has released several records under his own name. His album You | me (2017) was nominated to Nordic Music Prize, and received wide acclaim internationally. As a composer he has made music for Australian Art Orchestra, Canadian string quartet Quatuor Bozzini, Kitchen Orchestra and Trondheim Jazz Orchestra of Norway, and has collaborated with Jenny Hval (on the 2012 collaborative album “In The End His Voice Will Be The Sound Of Paper”, Tony Buck of The Necks (on the album “You | me”), Lasse Marhaug, Christian Wallumrød, poet Caroline Bergvall and many others. His last record Vesper with Australian Art Orchestra was nominated for a Norwegian Grammy in 2020 in the contemporary category. Hereafter is the ninth album under his own name.
“Kim Myhr is a master of slow-morphing rhythms and sun-dappled textures that seem to glow from the inside”. -       The Guardian

Kim Myhr & Kitchen Orchestra Hereafter VI

Kim Myhr & Kitchen Orchestra: Hereafter VII

Leviathan 2014 Sound Track
From Album "Akhnaten" By  "Philip Glass"
Act 1 Prelude Refrain Verse 1 Verse 2

Leviathan 2014 SoundTrack - Akhnaten / Philip Glass

TORRES - SPRINTER

iTunes pre-order: ptsnre.co/SprinteriTunes
CD / LP pre-order link: ptsnre.co/Sprinter

New Album May 4, 2015 // May 18, 2015 [UK/EU] via Partisan Records

Web: www.torrestorrestorres.com
Facebook: facebook.com/torresmusicofficial
Twitter: twitter.com/torreslovesyou
Instagram: instagram.com/torreslovesyou

Sprinter

Cowboy Guilt

Marco Lucchi : synth, tape and treatments

morphing and playing along "Water" by Jonny Greenwood

Lisa Moore : piano
Olivia De Prato : violin
Lauren Radnofsky : cello
Greg Chudzik : bass
Paul Coleman and Elena Moon Park : tanpura

to Olivier Messiaen

A glass of water [alt version]

inspired by 4. Berliner Herbstsalon | Women for Rojava | Intervention
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZcqUknNepg

build a mountain

Solitary simplicity cried out to me for this one

But the Moon Does Not Stare Back

But The Moon Does Not Stare Back (NaviarHaiku 343)

1Aug20

My naviarhaiku343 submission
https://www.naviarrecords.com/2020/07/29/naviarhaiku343-persistently-i-stare/
:D

Boson Spin - Staring at the Moon [naviarhaiku343]

Previews of the new album by Quiet Places (Dennis White, https://soundcloud.com/charliemay and Dave Gardner), available on Transparent Gatefold 2LP and digital August 17th on A Strangely Isolated Place asip.me/asipv023

Quiet Places / Volume 1 (ASIPV023) [Previews]

20200801(1

Vilde&Inga: How Forests Think VIII

SOFA is a Norwegian record label for experimental music run by musicians Martin Taxt, Ingar Zach and Kim Myhr.