Lock Me Up, Lock Me Down is an album released on Carrier Records by a trio consisting of Fred Frith, Sudhu Tewari and Cenk Ergün that straddles free improvisation and meticulously planned composition. Before I get into the weeds of what this album has to offer I just want to say that it was a real joy to experience it. Whenever I receive a new album to review I typically listen through it a few times and take notes before I start to write the review. In the case of Lock Me Up, Lock Me Down I must have listened through the album 3-4 times before ever writing anything down, mostly because I was so taken by it I didn’t want to interrupt the sound world that was created. The album consists of 7 individual tracks and clocks in at around 43 minutes, but is experienced as a single through-composed experience. I’ll try to do it justice with the following. With Frith on guitar, Tewari on “junk percussion” and electronics, and Ergün on additional electronics, there is a wealth of sound sources, timbres and colors heard throughout the album. At times they complement each other wonderfully, in other moments are a perfect juxtaposition of light and dark, of serenity and agitation, of beautiful and ugly (and I mean that in the most positive way!). After my first full listen of the album I immediately started it over before realizing I probably needed to give it some time to digest before diving in for a second helping, but it’s not an understatement to say that this particular album really gave me a lot of what I look for when seeking out new artists. Though it’s definitely not going to appeal to everyone’s tastes, it absolutely satisfied my personal aesthetic palette; with resonant full-bodied guitar work, gritty distortions, colorful percussion, and an abundance of electronic noises it’s like getting lost in the most sonically engaging warehouse you could imagine. The most intriguing aspect of this album, though, is how it was created. The source material for the album came from an improvisation session between Frith, Tewari and Ergün recorded around 2009/10 in Emeryville, CA. However, what you hear on the album isn’t simply the result of that recording session. The tracks on Lock Me Up, Lock Me Down are the work of Ergün sitting with the material and meticulously extracting a library of sound objects and moments, from microsounds to long complete phrases. He then re-composed the improvisations into a more calculated and planned compositional framework, which is what you hear on the album. I had the pleasure of speaking with Ergün about the process and he explained that it was a combination of listening to what was there and allowing some of the materials to exist in longer phrases as they were recorded while adding to and enhancing the phrases - short and long - with other sounds taken from various places throughout the full improvisation. With the exception of two tracks - the title track “Lock Me Up, Lock Me Down” and “Stay Tuned” - all the material heard is created through repurposing material from the improvisation to fit into a concise musical structure. The title track “Lock Me Up, Lock Me Down” is essentially a Fred Frith improvisation. Ergün added material from other sections like in the rest of the album, but the atmospheric and at times mesmerizing guitar work is all Frith. The other track, “Stay Tuned” is a very fun track, and is also essentially an unedited improvisation on Tewari’s Street Piano instrument (pictured below). In addition to being an improviser and composer, Tewari is also an imaginative instrument builder. The music heard on “Stay Tuned” is from recordings of improvisations on the street piano and the variety of sounds it can produce, from pitched resonances to dark muted percussive attacks. It’s difficult for me to talk about this album the way I typically do in a review in which I say a bit about each track on the album. The reason it’s so difficult with Lock Me Up, Lock Me Down is because it truly is one extended musical experience. Yes, there are moments, there are points of contrast, there are sounds, melodies and phrases that reappear and are developed. But to talk about any one track in detail in terms of what it contains in comparison or contrast to other tracks, I think, misses the forest for the trees, and that’s part of the real genius of this album. Cenk has accomplished something truly impressive here. He created a well-composed structural musical narrative while maintaining the exploratory organic nature of improvisation. His re-composition cleverly guides the listener from one moment to another and develops motives in a manner that one would expect from a fully composed piece. And yet, simultaneously there is still a sense of listening to a group of highly skilled improvisers communicating and composing in real time. He very clearly identified the delicate balance of structured composition and the magic of improvisation. And for that reason, I find myself almost unable to really discuss this album in a track-by-track, moment-by-moment treatment, just like I would have difficulty reviewing a true free improvisation performance in that manner. My suggestion is that you check it out, listen to it in full, don’t skip tracks, and prepare yourself for repeated listenings, not because you have to, but because (if you’re like me) you’ll just want to. You can listen to Lock Me Up, Lock Me Down on Apple Music, Spotify, YouTube, Amazon Music, and can purchase the digital album on Bandcamp. Links to band members' websites below: Fred Frith Sudhu Tewari Cenk Ergün
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Sola is an album that consists of a single multi-movement piece for viola and electronics by Icelandic composer Anna Thorvaldsdottir, performed by Anne Leilehua Lanzilotti, released by New Focus Recordings as of today (Friday December 4)! This is the first of 3 digital releases by Lanzilotti of a project in which she commissioned three prominent composers of the 21st century. On a personal note, I really loved this album as I’ve been a fan of Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s music for many years, and this particular album offered some special insight into her music and process. This particular review will be a little different from previous album reviews I’ve done for KLANG. Typically I provide some of my own insights into the compositions of an album and, when possible, draw from the composers’ own words and program notes to draw additional conclusions about the music. Lanzilotti and Thorvaldsdottir, however, have done that work for me by including a lengthy discussion of this piece on the album itself! The first three tracks make up the actual composition, clocking in at 17:22. The remaining tracks are the performer and composer having a conversation about the piece, it’s structure, meaning, and Thorvaldsdottir’s process. So as to not spoil anything I won’t include much of anything from that conversation and will instead just provide my own impressions after listening through the composition a number of times, and I’ll leave you to listen to the rest. Before any kind of discussion can be had about the piece, it is absolutely key to know about the core concept behind it, which is isolation and solitude. Though Thorvaldsdottir wrote the piece in 2019, I cannot think of a more fitting concept for our collective experience in 2020, so for that reason alone this is a very timely album. The liner notes mention specifically searching for “the desire of calm and focus in chaos” and I personally think Thorvaldsdottir captured that feeling quite well, and Lanzilotti’s interpretation communicates that quite well. On a general note, this album offers some really impressive string writing and a wonderfully captivating performance. Lanzilotti brings a level of nuance and care to the material that is really demanding by this particular flavor of music. The piece is delicate and intimate, but not weak in what it has to say and the narrative it tells. I think that comes through very clearly in Lanzilotti’s performance on this recording. The musical materials create an interesting tapestry that straddles ambient soundscapes and rhapsodic motivic development, albeit at a very slow pace for the most part. Thorvaldsdottir melds these two soundworlds into a single symbiotic sonic organism that shifts seamlessly from one to the other throughout the composition. You’ll hear a wide collection of timbres and motivic gestures- underpressure bowed string noise, homophonic passages through sustained double stops, hauntingly beautiful melodies, and even brief moments of rhythmic pulsing on a single pitch. All of this comes to a head in the final 3 minutes of the opening prologue movement when the various ideas are presented in short fragments. These eventually lead to a lush atmosphere created by a repeated viola melody in the upper register of the instrument. This is further augmented by delayed versions of the melody panned in the stereo field to enhance the physical spatial relationship of the fused sonic environments into a single undulating soundscape. The use of electronics is essential in telling the musical narrative of Sola. All electronic elements are fixed electronics derived from the samples of viola, which are then processed and layered underneath the soloist. At times create a sustained backdrop and atmosphere, at other times they present brief moments of foreground activity. The use of a homogenous timbral palette from electronic manipulation of samples taken from the viola reinforces the central concept of isolation and solitude. To maintain that level of interconnectedness between the acoustic and electronic realms - one in which the electronics are quite subtle yet always necessary - is not an easy feat, and it shows a highly attuned sensitivity in working with these elements. On a final note, the formal structure of Sola is quite interesting, from a proportional standpoint. The first movement, titled “Prologue,” is by far the longest, clocking in at 10.5 minutes. This introduces every element of the composition - acoustic and electronic. The listener has a chance to really live inside of each sonic space created through the various playing techniques in the viola, and the glacial pace of the movement allows the electronics to fuse gradually and really establish the organic nature of the disparate (though highly connected) sound sources. The second movement is incredibly short and offers an interesting contrast to the first. The same elements are included, but presented on a much shorter timeline in more rapid succession, as if condensing the entire prologue into a 2-minute vignette. I really enjoy the placement and character of this movement, and it gets to the heart of what isolation means, at least to me, in terms of passing time. When isolated and in solitude time ceases to have meaning, and by extension the experience of hearing these materials over the course of 10.5 minutes or just under 2 minutes, their impact is felt equally. It shows an incredible mastery of pacing from Thorvaldsdottir, and Lanzilotti’s performance reinforces that beautifully. The final movement - Epilogue - returns to a more gradual pacing of material. The electronics become more involved, particularly a repeated descending glissando motive (presented in the first movement as well) which acts as a consistent thread throughout. The viola material is centered more around the sustained chordal double-stops, creating a harmonic soup that feels it has no true beginning or end, though never feels incomplete. Like most other aspects of the composition it is nuanced and understated in a very compelling and satisfying way. In all, I cannot recommend Sola enough. The composition itself is quite compelling and, at least for me, offered an almost cathartic listening experience. Knowing that the central concept is about isolation I felt an almost kindred connection to it while listening. The treatment of narrative as a function of time and thematic development is just done so well on every level. Further, the extended conversation between Lanzilotti and Thorvaldsdottir that follows is a real treat. It’s not often we get to hear the composer’s own insights in such a candid and intimate way, let alone with the performer for whom the piece was written. If you’re a fan of new music with electronics you should check out this album. If you’re a fan of Anna Thorvaldsdottir or Anne Lanzilotti, you should check out this album. Even if you’re not a fan of contemporary music, electroacoustic music, or don’t know who Anna Thorvaldsdottir is, then you should definitely check out this album. It really is quite unique as far as new music albums go, and I’m very much looking forward to Lanzilotti’s next release. Sola is streaming on Apple Music and Spotify and can be purchased through New Focus Recordings. Click here for more information about composer/performer Anne Leilhua Lanzilotti Click here for more information about Anna Thorvaldsdottir |
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