Three Cellos
Kenneth Kirschner
Greyfade (greyfade.com)
Recently-founded creative record label Greyfade has taken contemporary music production and financial compensation ethics to a new level; they are refusing to stream. Not on any platform will you find their presentations; they offer downloads only. As described by Greyfade’s founder Joseph Branciforte when explaining some of the reasoning behind the download-only access, he refers to the resurgence of vinyl being the most intimate, commercial-free listening experience: “…in the digital realm, we believe that the direct download model most closely mirrors this private interaction and should be the preferred mode of exchange.” By avoiding the financial dissuasions of streaming, the label is committed to an artist-led production that hopes to fairly compensate creators for their work.
Although the hard copy of the accompanying linen-bound book was not available for this review, the PDF featured 87 pages of casually written blog-like descriptions of the process, beginning with the uncertainty of converting Kirschner’s digital composition Three Cellos to Branciforte’s painstakingly detailed transcriptions, to then being precisely interpreted by cellist Christopher Gross. The book may not be a gripping read for the average listener, but it does shed some interesting light on the process, the details and the complexities of composing and then notating from various MIDI sources. In the composer’s own words: “The primary challenge with transcribing my work is, of course, the total lack of metric structure… It’s not that the meters are strange or difficult – it’s that they’re just not there at all.”
This album will take some gentle peeling back to reveal the qualities it hopes to share, namely the dedication and craftsmanship that was poured into this translation from digital composition to acoustic interpretation. I might have enjoyed having access to the original MIDI compositions in order to fully appreciate the transformation. The nine tracks bear similarities but repeated deep listening slowly unfolds the nuances and range of energy played with supreme skill, precision and sensitivity by cellist Gross. A standout track is Part 3, the most dynamic and accessible in form.
