From: mclaren
Subject: More xen CD reviews
--
Kraig Grady's music is finally available on
CD.
The booklet is still at the printing plant, but
I've heard Kraig's CD. It's a "must have" for anypne
interesting in microtonality.
Kraig has been called "one of the best composers
in Los Angeles." That's a reasonable assessment,
perhaps an understatement.
Kraig is an overly modest xenharmonist who has built
an entire room full of his own ji instruments,
Kraig is an overly modest xenharmonist who has built
an entire room full of his own ji instruments,
primarily xylophones and metallophones, with a
few zither-and dulcimer-like designs played
with chopsticks & an old reed pump organ retuned
to ji.
Kraig uses Erv Wilson's CPS tunings exclusively
in his music.
Because Kraig also applies Erv Wilson's scale tree
(a subject about which Erv was forbidden me to
speak) to rhythm, the result is a series of compositions
which build slowly to a climax and then taper off.
Kraig's music is unique, memorable and haunting.
The sound is more South Seas than Partch's heavy-
on-the-plucked-strings Asian-influenced
ensembles...and in fact Kraig performs as a musical
group from the mythical isle of Anaphoria, where
doctors are forced to make a living by working as
musicians(!)
doctors are forced to make a living by working as
musicians(!)
An apt summary of Kraig Grady's compositional
practices can be found in issue 16 of Xenharmonikon,
available from Frog Peak Music. Kraig Grady's CD
is available from the composer: Kraig Grady, 2645
Crestmoor Place, Los Angeles CA 90065
The cost including U.S. shipping should run around
$17.00.
*Highly* recommended--you'll not find a complete
set of compositions using only Erv Wilson's tunings
anywhere else. If you claim to have any interest
in microtonality, you MUST hear this CD.
--
Brian Reinbolt's CD "It's Not That Simple" is available
from Artifact Recordings, 1374 Francisco Street,
Berkeley CA 94702.
Artifact, along with Tzadik Records, is a xenharonic
record label. Almost everything they release is highly
Artifact, along with Tzadik Records, is a xenharonic
record label. Almost everything they release is highly
detwelvulated. Reinbolt's CD features algorithmic
MIDI music--some pretty interesting, others
more along the lines of sonic wallpaper.
Reinbolt's "Simple" uses quartertones in a sparse
algorithmic soundscape. This CD is what you'd expect
from the San Francisco algorithmic xenharmonic
tradition a type of music almost universal in Frisco and
in danger of becoming a cliche. Nonetheless, every
composer's take on algorithmic (the next step beyond
"process" music) composition tends to be different enough
to sustain interest in the style as a whole--indeed, it's
far more different-sounding and more interesting to
the ear than individual uses of post-Webern serialism,
for example.
Thus Reinbolt's CD is well worth hearing, and more than
once.
Recommended.
once.
Recommended.
--
Mark Trayle's CD "Etudes and Bagatelles" on the same
label (Artifact Recordings) represents a slightly
different aspect of the uniquitous Frisco ji algorithmic
real-time computer tradition. Trayle uses a Power Glove
hooked to his NeXT machine to traverse musical space
by grabbing invisible "shelves" in mid-air.
Sometimes this triggers samples, sometimes it produces
flurries of notes, sometimes it controls which region of
the harmonic series a sequence of notes traverses.
In "Cant" and "Fulcrum," Trayle uses the NeXT Music Kit
to produce real-time harmonic series pitches and
run up and down them under control of his Power Glove.
The result is a lot more interesting-sounding than you'd
expect, and well worth hearing.
For my money some of Trayle's best work is not included
on this CD--viz., "Megabitchin'" the over-the-top surf guitar
For my money some of Trayle's best work is not included
on this CD--viz., "Megabitchin'" the over-the-top surf guitar
wash done with the plucked-string algorithm in real time:
but the wacko sonic mutation of late-night kung fu flick
sounds is pretty good (track 1, "cc:BTWT") all by itself.
In any case, this CD is worth buying just for the harmonic
series tracks.
--
The latest Bang On A Can CD "Cheating, Lying, Stealing,"
features Annie Gosfield's "The Manufacture of Tangled
Ivory." This is a composition for sampler which features
"detuned" (read: quartertone) pitches and DSP-massaged
piano sounds.
The composition is interesting, albeit not as well crafted
or as polished as John Eaton's 1965 "Quartertone Fantasy"
for 2 pianos, or Charles Ives' 1925 "Three Quarter-Tone Pieces"
(based on his 1904 quartertone "Chorale" for 2 string sections,
now lost).
Still, this CD is rhythmically fascinating and far more
now lost).
Still, this CD is rhythmically fascinating and far more
sophisticated in that regard than almost any other xenharmonic
music I've heard. The CD is worth a listen not only for Gosfield's
interesting and ultra-Nancarrowesque take
on quartertones, but also for David Lang's superb title piece
and Los V. Vierk's "Red Shift." As readers of this forum know,
Lois Vierk, Phill Niblock, David Lang, Julia Wolfe and Michael
Gordon are among the most interesting and impressive young
East Coast composers at work today.
As for West Coast composers, they don't exist and cannot
be spoken of--since they never play Lincoln Center.
--mclaren
