Brutal New Music Reviews

     Nirmali Fenn - When Apathy is Betrayal Just under an hour long, Nirmali Fenn's When Apathy is Betrayal  connects an intensely spiritual musical langu age with the visceral reality of the modern world. Written for two sopranos and an ensemble of flute, percussion, strings, and electronics, Fenn's music captivates the listener, forcing us to reflect with intent. The two sopranos,  Barbora Kabátková and Pavla Radostova, brilliantly navigate the demanding and theatrical writing, switching from independent virtuosic solo lines, to blending within the larger ensemble, to acting as one more-than-human combined vocal instrument - often supplemented with live electronics. The cohesive success of the work is largely due to the fact that  When Apathy is Betrayal is bookended by forceful drumming solos, inspired by Sri Lankan Kandyan drumming. The percussionists of Prague Modern, Štěpán Hon and Ladislav Bilan Jr., are able to seamlessly incorporate the style ...

     Duo Étrange - i wish i were dead With their debut album,   Duo Étrange , Sahara von Hattenberger and Vanessa Croome, presents a collection of contemporary works, blurring between art song and chamber music. Supported on some of the pieces by pianist, Joanne Kang, and clarinetist, Airat Ichmouratov,  i wish i were dead  claims to brazenly support contemporary classical music. Even on its fringes, the works are all focused around traditionally pleasant sounds and accessibility. Duo Étrange's mission also comes across as quasi-paradoxical, giving us all newly composed music, but only when directly related to ancient themes and traditional mystic texts.  Two pieces by Jeffrey Fong open the album, new commissions which set excerpts of a Medieval epic poem. Fong's jerky vocal writing is assuaged by Croome's incredibly lyrical voice, but it still results in the musical impression that the composer has no care whether or not the text is hea...

   Portland Percussion Group -  Patterns & Form Their first album out on New Focus Recordings,   Portland Percussion Group 's Patterns & Form  showcases their technical skills and aesthetic range as an ensemble dedicated to percussion chamber music. The three works included on the album were all written with a direct connection to the ensemble. Each approaches different stereotypes associated with percussion music, which tracks as all three composers are either also percussionists or heavily involved in the world of percussion music.  The titular work, Alejandro Viñao's Patterns & Form , is presented in three movements and takes up a little more than half the album. It is by far the strongest of the three pieces presented here, both compositionally and in performance.  Viñao's  work is composed for eight percussionists and piano, with this recording featuring guest pianist Yoko Greeney. The recording and mixing on this piece is in...

  Ensemble Dal Niente - portrait RE / Flux / Pacific Time Ensemble Dal Niente 's recent album features three composers, each of whom have a history of collaboration with the group. The commissioned works all have their own unique approach to Dal Niente's expertise with experimental music. As a whole, the album is an incredible example of how successful new works can be when there is a strong relationship between composers and the ensemble. Igor Santos' portrait R E  opens the album. T he sixteen-minute work for sampler and large ensemble immediately creates a grand sense of atmosphere with electronic white noise and ambient-sounding swells in the ensemble. Pretty quickly, the sampler sounds Santos chooses come across as cliché and the computer start-ups noises gimmicky . Despite this, Santos incorporates some incredible moments of beauty throughout the piece. His use of the recording of Paulo Freire and dec onstructing it with the low instruments in the ensemble is both eng...

 Peter Paulsen - Shanghaied Paisano album review The audience is a floating spectator, journeying across Paulsen's interpretation of Ferlinghetti's poetic documentary. In his latest album, Peter Paulsen , composer and bassist, expands upon his previous chamber jazz output, moving closer to a contemporary third stream. Shanghaied Paisano combines the talents of Paulsen's TurksHeadKnot contemporary trio with the Latin-influenced  Dalí String Quartet . The album, released August 2023 via Navona Records , comprises of the titular, large-scale four-movement work inspired by the poetry of Lawrence Ferlinghetti and closes off with a rousing arrangement of Jobim's Chega de saudade .  Shanghaied Paisano 's opening movement, "And Then Went", starts the audience off with a dissonant chorale led by Chris Bacas on soprano saxophone. Paulsen's clean voicings make the chords approachable and give off a clearly distinguishable melody within the dense harmonies. The re...

 David Biedenbender - All We Are Given We Cannot Hold  album It has taken these weighing emotions and transformed them into pure beauty in the form of art song. With his first monographic album, David Biedenbender continues to prove himself as an chamber music composer while showcasing his delicate text setting ability. Distributed by Blue Griffin Recording , All We Are Given We Cannot Hold  juxtaposes two works for voice and ensemble using text by poet  Robert Fanning  with two older instrumental pieces featuring the Garth Newel Piano Quartet . Overall, album takes the listener on an emotional journey, rapidly swinging between parental worries and pondering natural monolithic beauty. Shell and Wing , a two-part work for soprano and ensemble, establishes a sense of unease from the first fluttering note. Setting newly-written text by Fanning, both the music and poetry contemplate parents' personal fears when sending their children out into the modern world ...

 Constellation Men's Ensemble - Man Up / Man Down Constellation's impeccable blend and intonation brings out a resonant beauty for the duration of the album. After ten years, Constellation Men's Ensemble  has released their debut album, Man Up / Man Down  on the Sono Luminus label. The album's longer and intense titular work is bookended by two shorter bursts of peaceful reflection, Home and manifesto . Constellation's impeccable blend and intonation brings out a resonant beauty for the duration of the album, and are becoming a prominent force within the new music vocal community. Jeffrey Derus ' Home , setting text by Carl Sandburg, opens the album with beauty and tonal simplicity. Derus' music is drawn from his personal experience with choirs, resulting in Constellation creating a beautiful resonance with stellar intonation. Home is in a traditional three-part form, with the middle section in a pulsating quintuple meter. Derus' repetitive text setting...

 Pathos Trio - Polarity album review Polarity  is such a highly polished example of how rewarding it can be to merge contemporary classical music with electronica. Released September 15th on the Imaginary Animals label, Polarity wedges itself in a specific niche between contemporary classical music and electronica. The collaborative album combines the performance capabilities of  Pathos Trio with six composers, all of whom have written pieces specifically for the trio, and Four/Ten Media , which is creating accompanying music videos for each track. With the only unifying feature being the implementation of electronics, it is quite impressive how the six new works form such a cohesive collection. Pathos Trio, made up of two percussionists and a pianist, completely reimagines the idiom of the chamber ensemble, embracing the possibilities of electronic integration within live performance. For many non-classical audiences, these instruments and setup may already be com...

 Jessica Meyer - GAEA Concerto for Amplified Viola GAEA  truly shows off Meyer's chops as a performer/composer. Jessica Meyer , recently appointed viola faculty member at Manhattan School of Music , is both an accomplished composer and violist. Her recent endeavor has combined the two together, creating GAEA , a twelve-minute programmatic concerto for amplified viola and chamber orchestra in a single movement.  Opening with a timpani bang and some impressive bass clarinet playing, GAEA grabs the audience's attention from the get-go. Performed by The Orchestra of The League of Composers  under the baton of director Louis Karchin , the ensemble effectively navigates the tonal, yet tricky music. Unfortunately, the ensemble is not without flaw. Recurring intonation issues become increasingly apparent within the brass trio as the work develops. Meyer astonishes with her pure tone and meaningful lyricism, clear in both her performance and composition. As she mentions ...

 Eric Nathan - Some Favored Nook Some Favored Nook , the latest release by composer Eric Nathan , is a dramatic, fifty-minute long song cycle for soprano, baritone and piano. Using a libretto by Mark Campbell , Some Favored Nook  dramatizes the relationship between poet Emily Dickinson and abolitionist Thomas Wentworth Higginson, using Dickinson's poetry and various letters as source material. The extended song cycle features some incredible performers, who do their best to salvage the music. Tony Arnold , soprano, and William Sharp , baritone, trade off songs all accompanied by pianist Seth Knopp. In his music, Nathan favors the use of space and recitative-style text setting. Often it results in him being too careful. Clearly he is favoring simplistic lines in order to ensure the text is understood immediately. Unfortunately, his choice works against him. The vocal lines are forgettable and plain boring, with the added space breaking the natural flow of the text. Similarly, t...

 Yotam Haber - Bloodsnow album review Haber composes wildly stimulating music, with sections ranging from hair-raising to ominously meditative. Currently on faculty at UMKC Conservatory, Yotam Haber composes wildly stimulating music, with sections ranging from hair-raising to ominously meditative. His most recent release, Bloodsnow , out on Sideband Records , is a collection of journeys, with reflections of his experiences in Alaska encasing the album. As a whole, Haber's music feeds into the traditional complexity of contemporary classical music, but does so with gripping dignity.  Bloodsnow , the opening titular work performed by the Talea Ensemble , is the first in Haber's cycle of pieces inspired by his time spend in the Alaskan wilderness. The cold potential of natural violence underlines Haber's music, placing the listener perpetually on edge. The work, scored for flute, clarinet, string trio and piano, with the strings and piano doubling on harmonicas, completely ...

 Fatrin Krajka - The Space In Between   album review Krajka focuses on approachability in his simple and tonal music, relying on harmonic cliches to evoke a melancholic emotional response. Albanian-American composer and pianist, Fatrin Krajka , is known for his film scores and continued approach to classically inspired minimalism. His latest album release, The Space In Between , intimately connects individual perspectives with a sense of communal emotion. The Space In Between is a full-length album for piano and strings divided up into 4-5 minute long tracks. Within his exploration of the short-form piece, Krajka solidly focuses on approachability in his simple and tonal music, relying on harmonic cliches to evoke a melancholic emotional response from the listener. There is a negligible difference in his approach to scoring for film and this album of more traditional classical music. While I would have appreciated some experimentation and variation within Krajka's minimal...

 Paul Royse - Swinging Seraphim Royse provides a great example of a classically trained composer turned indie-pop artist. Swinging Seraphim is the latest release by record label Belts and Whistles . The album consists of six stunning art-pop songs for voice and piano, composed and performed by the Philadelphia-based  Paul Royse , who also goes by Very Very Hot Evil. As a whole, the aesthetic of the songs lean more into a progressive rock/pop style, which is further strengthened by pop/rock mixing techniques of Johanna Baumann . The concept of the classical composer as an indie singer/songwriter has been becoming more and more popular. In contrast, Royse provides a great example of a classically trained composer turned indie-pop artist, rather than a true blend of the two genres. All of the songs rely heavily on Royse' complex piano accompaniments. It is quite impressive to hear the composition/piano/voice all done by the same performer, but one has to wonder if it will be equa...

 Thomas Schuttenhelm - luminaries at the tonehenge A fun new work by Thomas Schuttenhelm , luminaries at the tonehenge , premiered at Tidewater Classical Guitar by the New York City Guitar Quartet . Schuttenhelm, being a guitarist himself, aptly utilized a full spectrum of extended techniques; the first full minute of the work solely comprised of various percussive tapping and knocking sounds. luminaries at the tonehenge developed these rhythmic percussion effects into a fully established musical groove with an intensely rigid sense of pulse, perfectly maintained by the quartet. By adding a funk-tango bassline and noise-adjacent techniques, Schuttenhelm manufactured an effective and cohesive backdrop to place melodic fragments and high dissonant chords. luminaries is an exquisite example of what a contemporary classical guitar quartet can accomplish and Schuttenhelm writes for the ensemble in a manner which is idiomatic for the players and engaging to the audience. watch the full ...

John Luther Adams - Darkness and Scattered Light album review Darkness and Scattered Light  is an unmissable entry in the catalogue of John Luther Adams' music and classical music in general. Darkness and Scattered Light  is John Luther Adams ' latest release through Cold Blue Music . Featuring the late double bass virtuoso Robert Black , Darkness and Scattered Light is a collection of world premiere recordings of Adams' music for the double bass. Longtime collaborators and friends, Adams' music and Black's dedication to the promotion of contemporary composers pair together perfectly. Black's total mastery and understanding of his instrument fosters a sense of pure, unencumbered musicality.  Darkness and Scattered Light is an unmissable entry in the catalogue of John Luther Adams' music and classical music in general. The album is a fitting musical memorial to the genius of Robert Black, and while so tragic, we are all incredibly fortunate to have Darkness a...

 Jerome Begin Wilderness  explores the intricacies of the acoustic-electric timbre spectrum in a manner which is rhythmically and musically stimulating. Wilderness , the latest release by Sandbox Percussion combines a curious exploration of acoustic instruments with live-time electronics and highly theatrical writing. Composed by Jerome Begin in 2016, Wilderness is a multi-movement work originally written to accompany a contemporary dance production by Brian Brooks Moving Company . Begin, acclaimed for his theatre and dance scores, intrinsically incorporates a sense of motion into his music, which still comes across in a concert setting. Wilderness explores the intricacies of the acoustic-electric timbre spectrum in a manner which is rhythmically and musically stimulating. The album starts off with quite a literal Entrance . The militaristic arpeggios of pitched toms create a sense of how much physical space the work encompasses, setting up the listener for the remainder of ...

 Zachary James - Song of Myself less like a classical song cycle and closer to a modern beatnik poetry reading. Zachary James , renown operatic and music theatre bass, makes his compositional debut with Song of Myself . Comprising of twelve songs, Song of Myself  sets sections of Walt Whitman's similarly-named poem. James presents Whitman's text without reduction or addition, with each included section of the extended poem separated into its own track. James is joined here by three performers (and an uncredited pianist): Ariel Campos on percussion, Wick Simmons on cello, and Frederick Poholek on guitar. The album comes across as less like a classical song cycle and closer in resemblance to a modern interpretation of a beatnik poetry reading. There is no sense of melody and little sense of prosody in James' setting. Each word of the text is cleanly separated, making it easy for himself to laboriously enunciate each syllable, which is not always necessary. The slow, dirge...

 Austin Wulliman - The News from Utopia  album review The News from Utopia  scatters dream-like fragments of sound and noise, combining contemporary musical techniques with electronics and over-dubbing. While separated into six distinct tracks, The News from Utopia  functions as a single, concert-length work in the form of an album. The upcoming release by JACK Quartet violinist and now composer, Austin Wulliman , brings listeners through a distorted, yet somehow familiar crusade, culminating with "The Lazy River", inspired by Zadie Smith's short story of the same name. Releasing on Bright Shiny Things  September 15, The News from Utopia  scatters dream-like fragments of sound and noise, combining contemporary musical techniques with electronics and over-dubbing.  Starting off the album with a high-pitched, almost alarm-like beeping, "Docks" introduces us to Wulliman's personal alternate reality. Soon after, he introduces glissandi and percussive laye...

Nikolaus Gerszewski - ART Shockingly,  ART  accomplishes nothing musically, while sounding complex and intricate. Visual artist and composer Nikolaus Gerszewski  is an avid organizer and supporter of experimental music. His set of pieces for string quartet, ART , is released as a full-length album of the same name by Flea, a new music label. ART is a collection of short sound experiments primarily utilizing microtonal inflections, gradual glissandi, and long repeated sections. Gerszewski draws on his background as a visual artist to give us these pieces, which are representational of the literal act of creating a painting through slow, even brushstrokes. ART is certainly an exploration within contemporary classical string quartet playing. While being beautiful and harmonious, the work pushes against Gerszewski's stated personal musical goals. Shockingly, ART accomplishes nothing musically, while sounding complex and intricate. The album is broken into two sectio...

 Third Coast Percussion - Between Breaths album review Third Coast Percussion 's upcoming album, Between Breaths , is a collection of world premiere recordings of works all specifically composed for the quartet. The album, released by Cedille Records  on September 8th, is a follow up to TCP's 2022 album, this time exploring meditation and breaching sonic landscapes. The included works on Between Breaths  are all expertly performed here by the quartet, as their style leans into the group's strengths. The album opens with a new five-movement work by Missy Mazzoli . Millennium Canticles musically depicts a post-apocalyptic group of humans looking to recreate old rituals. Mazzoli's music is as nonsensical as it sounds. The actual fleeting moments of music are quite pleasant, but the Canticles  are disoriented with loud, audible breathing (assuming this is from whence the album title comes), awkwardly half-shouted counting (which sounds reminiscent of high school drumline...