#avantgarde

Ended Thursday and welcomed Friday with Three Dances & Four Organs by John Cage / Steve Reich / Michael Tilson Thomas / Ralph Grierson, released on Angel Records in 1973. Review by Brian Olewnick The first side is devoted to John Cage's extraordinary Three Dances for two amplified, prepared pianos, certainly one of his most accessible works and arguably one of his most sensuously beautiful...Steve Reich's Four Organs has one simple but deep idea. Take a dense electric organ chord and then, with extreme patience and slowness, gradually lengthen each note that makes up the chord so that one journeys from the rigorous exactitude of the opening statement (with regular rhythmic accompaniment by maracas) to a languorous sonic cloud where each of the constituent elements has been freed to waft away on its own... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJlTVv_noSc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Li7m6HqNhq4 #JohnCage #SteveReich #AvantGarde #Minimalism #Music #MichaelTilsonThomas #RalphGrieson #PreparedPiano

Witch 'n' Monk by Witch 'n' Monk, released on Tzadik in 2020. John Lewis wrote for the Guardian: Witch ‘n’ Monk are a theatrical Anglo-Colombian duet featuring two very different musicians. Mauricio Velasierra plays a variety of flutes, while Heidi Heidelberg is a classically trained soprano singer who plays spiky prog-punk riffs on guitar while using looper pedals.. This self-titled LP, recorded in rural Wales and in a former Stasi bunker in Berlin, is their first for John Zorn’s Tzadik label, and you can see what attracted a sonic anarchist such as Zorn to their music. They talk of “abandoning the egoistic 20th-century idea of the lone, male composer writing his opus” by recording stream-of-consciousness music: hours of sleep-deprived, endlessly mutating improvisations are sliced up and used as the basis for these slightly manic musical collages... https://www.theguardian.com/music/2020/may/15/witch-n-monk-witch-n-monk-review https://witchnmonk.bandcamp.com/album/witch-n-monk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8TbO5Bz8y0&list=RDf8TbO5Bz8y0&start_radio=1 #WitchnMonk #Music #Tzadik #AvantGarde

Poster for the concert at which Terry Riley's Poppy Nogoods All Night Flight (The First Ascent) The Letter Edged In Black Press Inc. – S.M.S. Issue 3 was recorded #TerryRiley #Minimalism #ConcertPoster #AvantGarde

Ended the week and welcomed the weekend with Poppy Nogoods All Night Flight (The First Ascent) by Terry Riley, released in 1968 on The Letter Edged In Black Press Inc. in 1968 on reel to reel. There were only 25 original copies and they go for £1,500 https://gerrishfineart.com/product/poppy-nogoods-all-night-flight-the-first-ascent/ Blog The Hum describes the music as "... It is beautiful psychedelic droning swirl of delayed saxophone lines, and organ, and completely engrossing." https://blogthehum.com/2016/02/25/terry-rileys-poppy-nogoods-all-night-flight-the-first-ascent-from-sms-3/ https://www.dailymotion.com/video/xx63yc #TerryRiley #Minimalism #Music #ReeltoReel #AvantGarde

Ended Monday and welcomed Tuesday after a walk under azure skies with Three Strange Angels by Peter Garland, released in 2008 on Tzadik, Review by Anthony Tognazzini Released on John Zorn’s Tzadik label, THREE STRANGE ANGELS is actually a reissue of recordings made by avant-garde composer Peter Garland near the beginning of his career. The spare, lyrical compositions reflect Garland’s interest in traditional Native American and Mexican music, as well as the minimalist strain of American experimental music. With an ensemble that includes violin, harp, recorder, and percussion, Garland and company create delicate sonic tapestries that are as lovely as they are otherworldly. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LFo4Lu4It0c&list=RDLFo4Lu4It0c&start_radio=1 #PeterGarland #Music #AvantGarde #Minimalism #Tzadik