Kris Defoort – The Time of Our Singing
Claron McFadden; Mark S. Doss; Simon Bailey; Levy Sekgapane; La Monnaie Chamber Orchestra; Kwamé Ryan
Fuga Libera FUG837 (outhere-music.com/en/albums/kris-defoort-time-our-singing)

Belgian composer Kris Defoort’s multilayered opera The Time of Our Singing follows members of a mixed-race family through the years 1939 to 1992. Repeatedly they are torn apart by the pernicious effects of the racism they each have to confront in their lives. But their shared passion for music always brings them back together. 

Defoort and his compatriot, librettist Peter van Kraaij, have adapted a 629-page novel by Richard Powers, published over 20 years ago. In contrast to the novel, which jumps around in time, the opera follows a traditional chronological narrative. The harmonic language is familiar, the rhythmic structure clear. Yet it sounds startlingly new, and fundamentally of our time. 

The many musical references are taken directly from Powers’ novel. Since they are integral to the story, Defoort weaves them right into the texture of the opera. The sounds of Dowland, Purcell, Bach, Puccini, spirituals, cool jazz, rock, hip-hop, free jazz and rap all shape the characters in this African American-Jewish family. The hip-hop beat that drives the activist daughter Ruth’s sensational I will tell you about Blackness has an urgency that intensifies her fury. Exquisite modernist textures colour the heartbreaking deathbed scene between the father, David, a Jewish refugee from Nazi Germany, and younger son Joey, a pianist. The transformation of Purcell’s Music for a While into an infectiously catchy vocal ensemble is used to bring the three siblings together for what turns out to be the last time. “Classics meets the street,” the eldest son Jonah, an opera singer, says. “People need this,” he adds. Indeed.

Defoort and van Kraaij draw on key historic events in the never-ending struggle for civil rights in America. Inevitably what happens globally impacts each character directly. Marian Anderson’s concert at the Lincoln Memorial in 1939 brings hope and joy to Delia, an African American singer, and David when they first meet there. But the Rodney King riots in 1992 bring tragedy for Jonah. 

This live recording was made during the first staged production at La Monnaie in 2021, which won the the International Opera Award 2022 for Best World Premiere. The excellent cast, with Claron McFadden, Abigail Abraham, Lilly Jørstad, Levy Sekgapane, Simon Bailey, Peter Braithwaite and Mark S. Doss, the jazz quartet featuring Mark Turner’s melancholy tenor saxophone, the La Monnaie Chamber Orchestra and choirs, are all led by Canadian-Trinidadian conductor Kwamé Ryan with palpable insight and versatility.

Henri-Joseph Rigel and the Winds of Revolution
Magali Simard-Galdes; Nicholas Scott; Melisande McNabney; Arion Baroque Orchestra; Mathieu Lussier
ATMA ACD2 2828 (atmaclassique.com/en/product/rigel-and-the-winds-of-revolution)

The name Henri-Joseph Rigel is probably an unfamiliar one today, but during his lifetime he was a highly esteemed composer and conductor in 18th century France. Born Heinrich-Joseph Riegel in Wertheim am Main in 1741, he moved to Paris in 1767 where he soon earned a reputation in musical circles for his harpsichord pieces, symphonies and concertos, in addition to 14 operas.

It seems particularly appropriate that the Montreal-based Arion Ensemble Baroque has chosen to uncover the music of this deserving but largely forgotten composer on this splendid recording titled Le Souffle de la Révolution under the direction of Mathieu Lussier. Collaborating with the Centre de Musique Baroque de Versailles, the group presents a program not dissimilar to a concert of the period in its attractive mix of orchestral works, concertos, arias and duets. 

Leading off the program are the overture and three arias from Rigel’s 1781 pastoral comedy Blanche et Vermeille, the vocal pieces artfully performed by Québec soprano Magali Simard-Galdès and British-born tenor Nicholas Scott. The singers both do justice to this unfamiliar repertoire and return later in the program for arias from Rigel’s revolutionary period operas Pauline et Henri and Alix de Beaucaire.   

The Symphony Op.12 No.2 and the Fortepiano Concerto in F Major are fine examples of the Viennese classical style – do I detect echoes of Haydn? The concerto features soloist Mélisande McNabney who offers a stylish performance and provides a convincing cadenza while under Lussier’s competent baton, Arion proves a solid and sensitive partner. 

Like finding a treasure in an attic, the discovery of this hitherto unknown music is a delight and a big merci to the AOB not only for some fine music making, but for rescuing it from oblivion.

Robert Nathaniel Dett – Northern Magnolias
Luke Welch
Independent (lukewelch.ca)

When we think of musical contributions made by Black composers in America during the late 19th and early 20th century, names like Scott Joplin or William Handy may come to mind most immediately. Yet alongside these composers were others such as William Grant Still and Florence Price who were more closely aligned with the late-Romantic European tradition. This list would also include Robert Nathaniel Dett who was born near Niagara Falls, Ontario in 1882.

Dett began piano studies when he was five and later studied at the Oberlin Conservatory in Ohio where he was the first Black graduate to receive a Bachelor of Music degree. He enjoyed a successful career as a composer, pedagogue and conductor and a fine selection of his piano works appears on this delightful – and attractively-packaged – recording by Toronto-based pianist Luke Welch.

The disc opens with the five-movement Magnolia Suite from 1912, Dett’s first large-scale work for piano. Movements such as The Deserted Cabin and The Place where the Rainbow Ends are highly evocative, harkening back to a more innocent age. Other compositions range in date from 1913 to 1922, all of them finely crafted miniatures with a wide range of contrasting moods. After the Cakewalk clearly shows the influence of Scott Joplin with its syncopated rhythms and ragtime harmonies, while His Song from the suite In the Bottoms is quietly introspective.

Throughout, Welch displays a real affinity for this engaging repertoire, his playing elegant and sensitively articulated. The disc concludes with the Inspiration Waltzes from 1903. Ebullient and joyful, this is very much music of its time and Welch treats it with great panache, rounding out a most satisfying program.

Beethoven – Piano Concerto No.1 in C Major; Sally Beamish – City Stanzas
Jonathan Biss; Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra; Omer Meir Wellber
Orchid Classics ORC1003339 (orchidclassics.com/releases/orc100339-beethoven-5-vol-2)

This is the second volume of a series of the five Beethoven concertos from pianist Jonathan Biss, each pairing a newly commissioned piano concerto with the Beethoven work that inspired it. Here, Beethoven’s Concerto No.1 in C Major Op.15 is paired with City Stanzas by British composer Sally Beamish. The opening tutti of the Beethoven is immediately warm and elegant, with the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra directed by Omer Meir Wellber in fine form. Biss’ entrance is sensitively shaped and coloured, with the piano balanced slightly forward. The central development section is darkly atmospheric, piano and orchestra creating a stilled and mysterious hush which still manages to keep a sense of forward momentum. Biss plays the longest of the three cadenzas Beethoven wrote, but it does not outstay its welcome despite its oversized dimensions; Biss is by turns dramatic, playful, and improvisatory, with an acute awareness of the unexpected harmonic shifts. The Adagio second movement is deeply serene, and the finale playfully energetic, with Biss and Wellber making the most of the music’s many contrasts. Throughout, Biss is especially impressive in the sparkling clarity of his passagework. In short, this is a performance both sophisticated and exciting that fully delivers on the ambition and expressive depth of the young Beethoven. 

The companion work by Beamish is engaging and accessible, well-suited to Biss’ transparent textures and awareness of sudden character changes. While all the work is derived from some aspect of the Beethoven concerto – pitches, rhythms, and structure – the mood is dark and sardonic, inspired by urban decay, greed and anxiety for the future. The toccata-like opening movement is spiky and pointillistic, the second builds to a climax of deep anxiety, and the work concludes with a rhythmically dynamic rondo. As in the Beethoven, the performance is first-class, the recording detailed and realistic.

Liszt Metamorphosis
Charlotte Hu
Pentatone PTC 5187 259 (pentatonemusic.com/pianist-charlotte-hu-presents-liszt-metamorphosis)

It has been said that Franz Liszt quarried all available musical sources and reworked the material into showstoppers that revealed he could play octaves faster and hit the keys harder than anyone else; to even break piano keys. However, as these performances reveal that while there may indubitably be more than a dash of the showman in Liszt, his contribution to the development of 19th century music was immense. His pianistic fireworks represent just the surface, for in his symphonic approach to music he anticipated the tone poems of Strauss, the fluid structures of Wagner and the passionate romanticism of Schubert and Schumann. 

It may take more than one disc such as Liszt Metamorphosis from the prodigiously gifted pianist Charlotte Hu to demonstrate what Liszt’s enduring legacy did for not simply piano repertoire, but for music as a whole. However, Hu’s uncommonly deep dive into Liszt’s conception – and her own artistry – is a wonderful start. 

Liszt’s shining genius – and Hu’s own transmutation – is evident in the overwhelmingly powerful and authoritative readings of this performance. Hu unveils passion and piety in the Schubert transcriptions, especially Ave Maria (D 389), and the hair-raising Erlkönig (D.328).

To play Liszt’s 3 Concert Etudes S.144 requires formidable technique. To play them so that the poetry (rather than the effort) shines through – as in No. 3 Un Suspiro – requires a gift afforded to few. Hu’s Liszt shows her to be at the apogee of her art.

Johannes Brahms – The Symphonies
Chamber Orchestra of Europe; Yannick Nézet-Séguin
Deutsche Grammophon 486 6000 (deutschegrammophon.com/en/catalogue/products/brahms-the-symphonies-yannick-nezet-seguin-13508)

“I shall never write a symphony! You have no idea what it’s like, how hard it is to compose when always you hear the footsteps of that giant marching behind you,” Brahms wrote in a letter to the conductor Herman Levi in 1872, when he (Brahms) was 40 years old. So deeply had he struggled to write his first symphony, his early years spent in fear of being compared with Beethoven, that his first symphony didn’t see the light of day until 1876. 

Within a decade he had completed his second, third and fourth symphonies, a sequence so revered that many declared them to be the most distinguished symphonic music since Beethoven. Hans von Bulow, who conducted the premiere of Symphony No.4, famously declared that his favourite key was E flat (signified by the letter b in German),  for its three flat notes symbolised for him the “Holy Trinity” of Bach, Beethoven and now Brahms. 

No such shadows pursue Yannick Nézet-Séguin as he conducts the Chamber Orchestra of Europe through his cycle of Johannes Brahms: The Symphonies. He appears unfazed despite the fact that he follows such giants as Wilhelm Furtwangler whose 1940s/1950s cycle seethes with brooding energy and an overriding sense of tragedy. Nor is he affected by Herbert von Karajan’s traditionalist cycle. He does appear to give Nikolaus Harnoncourt’s brilliant cerebral cycle on period instruments a run for its money, though.  

The quality of the conducting by Nézet-Séguin, and the Chamber Orchestra of Europe’s playing on this cycle, is altogether exceptional. Nézet-Séguin takes nothing for granted in his Brahms, nor should we while listening, even if you know how Brahms “goes.” Not that he does anything wildly idiosyncratic, let alone provocatively iconoclastic, à la Glenn Gould and Leonard Bernstein. Rather, he plainly understands that every interpretation is just one possibility, and he offers us a very enticing opportunity to open our minds, especially to a familiar composer (and his works) most burdened by the weight of his great idol who bridged between the German Classical and Romantic tradition.

In the mighty rumble of timpani that opens the first movement of Symphony No.1 in C Minor Op.68 we find drama and power, followed by epic strivings, that develop into exultant triumphalism. At the end of the fourth movement we marvel at the degree of sage poetry that Nézet-Séguin imparts to Brahms’ epic achievement. This is followed by the refined, lustrous orchestral performance of Symphony No.2 in D Major Op.73. Particularly impressive are the massed cellos in their great melody in the slow movement, and the finale which develops bounding energy as it progresses.

Nézet-Séguin’s use of pivotal phrases to change the pace and emotional temperature allows him to suggest immense breadth of emotion coloured by an autumnal resignation in Symphony No.3 in F Major Op.90. Nézet-Séguin’s shepherding of the orchestra in an emotional rollercoaster of a performance of Symphony No.4 in E Minor Op.98 highlights the inner logic of Brahms’ brilliantly grave symphonic work. The performance of No.4 is evocative only of Carlos Kleiber’s version with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra. Nézet-Séguin certainly challenges that great master in the command of orchestral colour and electrifying dynamism in his performance. Overall we have a cycle of Brahms that is superlatively judged by Nézet-Séguin on his own terms. Bravo!

Forgotten Sounds
Graeme Steele Johnson; various artists
Delos DE3603 (naxos.com/CatalogueDetail/?id=DE3603)

Whether ‘tis nobler to let sleeping dogs lie, some folks will play archaeologist and unearth the bones of former titans, or giants, or mere mortals perhaps. Such is the admirable effort displayed on this disc by clarinetist Graeme Steele Johnson, assisted by some very fine chamber players. Forgotten Sounds is the title of both the album and the last track, an arrangement of Charles Loeffler’s pretty little bit of fluff originally for voice and piano, here played by Johnson with Bridget Kibbey on harp.

The centrepiece of this disc is Loeffler’s Octet (clarinets, strings and harp) discovered and recomposed by Johnson. It includes two clarinet parts just as Brahms’ original sketches for a nonet* did. Coincidence, you ask? Hmmm.  

Loeffler is referred to as a “cosmopolitan” composer, a European living in the U.S, acclaimed in his lifetime, ignored since. His style places him in the conservative end of the spectrum of post-Brahmsians, tonally less inventive than either Schoenberg or Zemlinksy, with quirky structural and timbral tropes both puzzling but pleasant. There’s no way of knowing how much the piece reflects decisions only the arranger could make, but verbatim it seems, like Saint-Saëns, Loeffler “lacked only inexperience.” Some of his compositional gambits make me wonder whether he wasn’t a bit cynical, providing what was expected of a European artist. Unoriginal post-colonial kitsch, if you will. 

A reduction for similar forces (minus clarinet two) opens the proceedings with a version of Prelude à l’après-midi d’un faune. Steele’s arrangement gives pride of place to the flute voice, played with enchanting lyricism by Ji Weon Ryu. Loeffler’s dabs of whole-tone scale colour indicates he respected the Frenchman’s music enough to borrow some of it for his own piece.

*(An aside: Brahms’ didn’t publish his nonet; it was rescued by his editor, with Brahms’ consent. Brahms showed the original chamber piece to Clara Schumann, who prompted him to rework it for orchestra. Eager to please, he abandoned his notion of answering the Beethoven Septet, and Schubert Octet. Using the same content he wrote his first orchestral serenade. Thank goodness for that editor, it’s a truly lovely chamber work.)

Schoenberg – Verklärte Nacht; Strauss – Eine Alpensinfonie
Vienna Philhamonic; Christian Thielemann
Cmajor DVD 766908 (naxos.com/CatalogueDetail/?id=766908)

Both of these celebrated tone poems were initially conceived in the final year of the 19th century. Schoenberg composed his string sextet in a mere three weeks; it took Strauss sixteen years and several false starts to complete his far more massive work. Curiously, both works begin with a similar slowly descending scale pattern.

Schoenberg’s work is presented here in his 1946 version for string orchestra, which is itself a minor revision of an earlier edition from 1917. A performance with a full string section (including eight double basses) always carries with it a risk of bloviation, but fortunately Christian Thielemann, with the sensitive assistance of concertmaster Rainer Honeck, manages to preserve the intimacy of the original chamber setting while providing moments of high passion when appropriate. Altogether, it’s a beautiful performance indeed.

The stage is packed to the gills in the massively scored Strauss tone poem, which requires the services of 125 players including such niceties as 12 off-stage horns, heckelphone, four-manual organ, two timpanists and quadruple winds. No other orchestra in the world has quite the same luscious sound as the Wiener Philharmoniker. This is due in large part to the unique construction of the trumpets, horns, clarinets and oboes that thrive only in Vienna. One might call this an “historically informed” performance, except that it has changed so little in the 154 years of the orchestra’s existence. 

Thielemann’s conducting of this flawless Strauss performance is largely non-interventionist compared to his occasional passionate gestures in the Schoenberg. In fact, it’s quite reminiscent of videos I have seen of Strauss’ own seemingly uninvolved conducting. They both lead with minimal gestures, but believe me, they have their eyes on you. Technically, I greatly appreciated the titles provided in the DVD identifying the 22 programmatic episodes of the work. The video quality itself is on the garish side, suitable for television transmission, and the camera work is excellent overall.

The fearsome Vienna Philharmonic is, notoriously, an orchestra without a permanent conductor that has their own way of doing things. I was reminded of the time they performed in Toronto at Roy Thomson Hall where, sitting in the choral balcony, I couldn’t help but notice how they consistently responded a microsecond behind the beat of the conductor, Franz Welser-Möst. Later, in the company of Robert Aitken, we met up with the flute section at a local pub where Bob asked them what they thought of their conductor for the evening. After some initial hesitation, one player volunteered, “We like him. He doesn’t get in the way!” That should tell you all you need to know.

Schoenberg – Pelleas und Melisande & Verklärte Nacht
Orchestre symphonique de Montréal; Rafael Payare
Pentatone PTC5187218 (osm.ca/en/news/pelleas-und-melisande-et-verklarte-nacht-by-schoenberg)

Mostly to infuriate the various factional music theorists, I hold that Arnold Schoenberg failed magnificently to escape tonality. He lived before “hardwired” entered the lexicon, but it seems he proved as well as anybody could that we no more invented “tonality” than we did “rhythm,” we unmasked our propensity to enjoy and exchange our thoughts with others through them. 

Both the works on this glorious disc display his thoughts in tone poems that are well-known if only partially loved. I belong to the group who is partial to all of Schoenberg’s thoughts; let the gorgeous playing of the MSO led by Rafael Payare, tell you the story (repeated in every age) of the young lovers who usurp the marriage of the woman to an older more powerful man, with tragic results for all. Pelleas  und Melisande in the hands of a German, more expressionist than impressionist, goes right there, all turbulent weather and sultry evenings. This is a tone poem, it’s music at the ultimate point of ripening, and these musicians are equal to the job of plucking its fruitful bounty.  

In a more modern take, Verklärte Nacht (from the poem of the same name) sets a scene where a lover tells his doubting beloved that the child she carries, though not “his,” will be his to love. I wish you could hear the strings right now as you read this. Compared to the other, larger work, this is almost restrained, but once the motifs start to overlap, one is delightfully lost between tonic and dominant.  

Liner notes are fascinating and informative. Buy two and give one away!

Stravinsky – Chamber Works
Barbara Hannigan; Royal Academy of Music; Juilliard School Ensemble
LINN CKD722 (outhere-music.com/en/albums/stravinsky-chamber-works)

In the ideal Platonic State, where dramatists, singers, instrumentalists, dancers, painters and poets dwell, Barbara Hannigan might occupy a place in its upper echelons. She is a formidable artist, whose dramaturgy brings human endeavour vividly to life. As a singer her soprano is luminous; nonpareil and informed by sublime, leaping and swooping lyricism. Her art may interpretate – not imitate – life, as a sage Plato would have it. But poetics that reach the Divine? And who could fault a director of celebrated orchestras who virtually writes her own script? Surely not even Plato who, in a moment of madness, may be seduced as well.

With Stravinsky: Chamber Works, Hannigan and Stravinsky seem perfectly matched. Both are shapeshifting musical omnivores who can become the music they perform. If you haven’t already been mesmerized by Hannigan’s Messiaen, Berg, Gershwin and Zorn, her Stravinsky will have you completely in her power. 

Hannigan reveals Stravinsky’s elements of “objectivist architecture” in the Octet and Septet with panache redolent of the master’s neo-classical genius. The spirited Dumbarton Oaks belies the subtle influence of Bach. The shorter works – poems and songs – are scintillating, revealing the musical chameleon in Stravinsky. The Juilliard School Ensemble and Royal Academy of Music perform with idiomatic grace under Hannigan’s baton, and Alexandra Heath’s soprano is spine tingling. Also notable is Charlotte Corduroy whose conducting elevates the Concertina, but it is Hannigan and Stravinsky who stand shoulder-to-shoulder in Plato’s State.

Béla Bartók - The Piano Concertos
Tzimon Barto; Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin; Christoph Eschenbach
Capriccio C5537 (naxos.com/CatalogueDetail/?id=C5537)

If your previous impressions of Bartók’s three piano concertos have been of predominantly percussive music, hammered at aggressively, this new recording will have you hearing the music afresh. In the promotional material for the album, pianist Tzimon Barto states, “Even Bartók needs a supple touch. If you bang away at it, without rhythmical buoyancy, of course it will become tedious.” Here, Barto is joined in the concertos by the Deutches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin conducted by Christoph Eschenbach.

For an example of the dividends this approach pays, listen to the beginning of the first concerto. In place of the usual martellato repeated A’s, the opening grows gradually and is remarkably atmospheric. Full advantage is taken of any calm moments here and in the second concerto, creating passages of rapt stillness which in other performances go by unnoticed. There is a notable softening of the edges as a result of this “supple” and “buoyant” approach. Perhaps due to the recording balance, in which the piano is recessed into the orchestra, Bartók’s carefully indicated and often sudden dynamic contrasts can, however, seem downplayed. True fortissimos are rare, even in the biggest climaxes. 

As another notable instance of Barto’s approach, take the opening of the third concerto, by far the most frequently performed of the three. The piano’s opening melody is played so freely and flexibly that it seems to float magically above the gentle string accompaniment. On the other hand, Bartók’s rhythms are nevertheless notated precisely, and reflect the folksongs and dances which are such an important ingredient in his musical language. Additionally, the first movement’s tempo is so slow (two minutes longer than in many other recordings) that the music risks losing forward momentum. These performances may shun percussive aggression, but they also downplay the rhythmic drive and precision that make Bartók’s music so unique. The orchestra, with some particularly fine contributions from the winds, sounds uneasy with the liberties of tempo and rubato, and ensemble suffers in several sections. 

Barto is to be commended for reminding us of the lyricism and delicacy inherent in Bartók’s music (listen to the composer’s own recordings of his piano works to hear this), but the extremes to which Barto goes to emphasize these elements may not be to everyone’s taste.

Envols – Canadian  Works for English Horn
Mélanie Harel; Valérie Dallaire
Centrediscs CMCCD33523 (cmccanada.org/shop/cmccd-33523)

Mélanie Harel’s Envols presents a captivating exploration of Canadian works for the English horn, showcasing the instrument’s expressive range and lyrical beauty. Recorded during the pandemic, this album is both a personal journey for Harel and a vital contribution to a relatively unexplored repertoire.

The album opens with Ian McDougall’s Nostalgica, where Harel’s rich, mellow tone shines alongside pianist Valérie Dallaire’s sensitive accompaniment. The interplay between the English horn and piano is seamless, setting a reflective mood that invites the listener into Harel’s world.

Christopher Tyler Nickel’s Sonata for English Horn and Piano takes a darker turn, beginning with an eerie melody that evolves through contemplative passages to a spirited finale. Emily Doolittle’s contributions are highlights of the album. Suppose I Was a Marigold is an introspective piece that allows Harel to delve into the instrument’s softer, more contemplative side. In contrast, Social Sounds from Whales at Night brilliantly showcases her skill in mimicking whale calls. Harel’s use of multiphonics and note bending, combined with the ethereal percussion and tape elements, creates a vivid underwater soundscape that is nothing short of mesmerizing.

Brian Cherney’s Epitaph for Solo English Horn provides a powerful showcase of Harel’s technical prowess, exploring a wide emotional range and highlighting the instrument’s upper register. This is followed by selections from Stewart Grant’s Études, where Harel demonstrates her control and agility, revealing the instrument’s capabilities in a variety of musical contexts. Tawnie Olson’s Plainsong and Paul Marshall Douglas’ Luquet further accentuate Harel’s lyrical abilities, blending expansive musical lines with the English horn’s unique timbre.

The album concludes with François-Hugues Leclair’s Le vol de l’épervier, where playful note bends and the sounds of chirping birds create a delightful auditory experience, leaving the listener with a sense of joy and exploration. Overall, Envols is a cohesive and engaging collection that not only highlights Harel’s exceptional talent but also elevates the English horn’s role within contemporary music.

Listen to 'Envols: Canadian Works for English Horn' Now in the Listening Room

Jon Siddall – Little Monster Dreams
Jon Siddall
Independent (jonsiddall.com)

BC-based composer, guitarist and music producer Jon Siddall’s career has for decades bravely straddled the not-always-amicable worlds of vernacular and contemporary classical music. I first met Siddall at York University in the mid-1970s when we were both students of composers James Tenney and David Rosenboom, among others. He continued his graduate composition studies in California with Terry Riley and was introduced to gamelan degung performance by Lou Harrison. Returning to Toronto, Siddall was inspired to combine those disparate musical streams and formed Evergreen Club Gamelan in 1983.

While Siddall’s been tapping into his garage band roots in recent years with his countrified Straightup Seven Hills band, in 2020 he also released Belvedere a self-described “slow music” instrumental album. His current EP Little Monster Dreams follows in the latter experimental ambient vein with two substantial instrumentals aesthetically harkening back to his earliest minimalist compositions.

The three-part Little Monster Dreams of Floating was performed by the composer playing heavily processed guitar, bells and other percussion, including gamelan gongs. The title is a tribute to his French bulldog, the “little monster” who was particularly fond of this music. Siddall describes his musical goal as “amplifying stillness by simplifying memory … the gentle meandering of the sounds relieving the need to keep track of time.”

The other work, With the Tides, consists of a dense chord slowly disintegrating over its duration, separated by silences of varying length. In additional to tidal cycles, the work also explores “what the Japanese call ‘ma’: the space in between things.” This sumptuous-sounding, formally terse, track was constructed solely using multi tracked blown bottles. 

Perceived form here is elusive, subverted, never quite materialising – a concern which “ultimately becomes unimportant” says the composer since, “we’re just with the sound. Is it music for meditation? Can be.”

Trees.Listen
Sharlene Wallace; Frank Horvat
I Am Who I Am Records (frankhorvat.com)

Canadian musicians/composers/educators Frank Horvat (fixed electronics) and Sharlene Wallace (Celtic lever harps) collaborated on this nine-movement exploration of the wonder of trees. It is inspired by medical biochemist/botanist Dr. Diana Beresford-Kroeger’s book To Speak for the Trees.

Each “tree track” is based on a letter from the ancient Celtic Ogham script, a medieval alphabet that named each letter for a type of tree. One musical note from A B C D E F G and H (B-flat) was chosen to be predominant in each movement. A five-phase process was then used to create the music – phase one harp improvised samples, phase two creation of electronic bed tracks, phase three live harp parts over electronics tracks, phase four finetuning and phase five making final album with producer Jean Martin. 

Opening Ailm – Pine features the note A throughout the harp strums, single plucked notes and softer repeated electronic grooves. Repeated lower harp and electronics add unexpected depth to this walk through a pine forest! Eabha – Aspen opens with electronic held sounds which then alternate with ascending harp strums and lines. Vibrating low held electronic notes under the more tonal harp parts make for an orchestral E sounding work exploring the wonder of trees! Fearn – Alder, with a F note focus, is very easy to listen to, tonal music with a happy colourful harp solo and electronic drumkit hits with detached harp notes for tree dancing!

Horvat and Wallace perform their storytelling tree music with spontaneity and virtuosity.

Jeremy Gignoux – Odd Stillness
Jeremy Gignoux; Various Artists
Independent n/a (jeremygignoux.bandcamp.com)

When listening to such bebop progenitors as Bud Powell and, most of all, Charlie Parker, an identifiable sense of forward motion is conveyed musically. The French musicologist and critic André Hodeir, commenting on this propulsive quality and how the music from this era seemed to push listeners towards frequent moments of climatic resolution, described it as jazz’s “vital drive.” This virtuosic sound, often characterized as teleological (goal directed) and synchronous with the ideas of American Modernism, set a high-water mark for excellence in music (regardless of genre) influencing much that came after it.

As the Calgary-based violinist Jeremy Gignoux explores on his fine 2024 recording Odd Stillness, there are other equally important modalities in music that include tranquility, harmonic stillness and an auditory acceptance of dissonance without resolution that can be equally engaging, musically compelling and ultimately satisfying for listeners. As the French-born bandleader and musical creative writes in the album’s liner notes, “Looking away from harmonic progression and instrumental virtuosity, this recording embraces stagnation, inviting the listener to contemplate the serenity or tension within the moment.”

It is, I suppose, an experiment of sorts to release a recording designed around the aesthetic of musical lethargy and inactivity, but in the capable hands of Gignoux and a terrific ensemble that includes the unorthodox instrumentation of bass flute, contrabass, trombone, trumpet, drums, voice and bass clarinet, this hauntingly beautiful music nudges listeners towards a highly personal relationship with a sound canvas that eschews as many genre labels as it does descriptive adjectives.