Search - Tom Johnson, Daniel Kientzy, Meta Duo :: Kientzy Plays Johnson

In Kientzy Loops, the accompanying loop is a mix of six alto saxophones played in continuous blowing, while the principal lines are played on alto saxophone, except for the third section, played on baritone. The piece, premiered at the auditorium of the ADAC in Paris, was awarded a French national prize in the Victoires de la musique as the best piece of contemporary music for the year 2000. We are indebted to our friend Marc Chemillier for La Tortue de mer. As a mathematician Chemillier became interested in the unique geometry of drawings made in the sand by the people of Vanuatu in the South Pacific. This (turtle) drawing, and there are many others, consists of a single line with a total of 103 turns, and one must draw the sequence so that the symmetrical form comes out just right. The drawing is systematic, and it also makes a lovely logical form when translated into music. We decided the sequence would sound best played on the contrabass saxophone, tuned an octave lower than the baritone, a rare instrument with heavy notes that seem to mimic the embarrassing slowness of these giant sea creatures. Narayana?s Cows, inspired by an Indian mathematician of the 14th century, and playable on any combination of instruments, is written on three staves: the complete melody, the reduced bass melody, and the drone. The present multi-track saxophone version is probably as rich and energetic as any of the large ensemble versions. The melody is played by threeoverdubbed sopranino saxophones in unison, the bass line is played by three baritones, and the drone is played by three altos. In each of the four Infinite Melodies the music follows a logical sequence requiring each subsequent phrase to become longer and longer, reaching out toward infinity. Since the four melodies are independent pieces, it is not necessary that they be played in the written sequence. In this case the interpreter ordered his four interpretations according to their contrast and durations, so that the CD ends with Infinite Melody No. 1. Here the music contains longer and longer silences, finally ending with a silence so long that it seems to dissolve into infinite silence as the CD player stops turning. Tom Johnson, born in Colorado in 1939, received degrees from Yale University, and studied composition privately with Morton Feldman. After 15 years in New York, he moved to Paris, where he has lived since 1983. He works with simple forms, limited scales, and generally reduced materials, but proceeds more logically than most minimalists, often using formulas, permutations, and predictable sequences. Daniel Kientzy is an international avant-garde artist, dedicated to contemporary music, exploiting the potential of all seven saxophones and the musical power of the electronic as well. Prior to his 25 years dedicated to this work, he participated professionally in almost all genres of western music, playing instruments as diverse as bass guitar, double bass, viola da gamba, recorder, bagpipes, and crumhorn. Meta Duo is a classical chamber music duo of a unique sort, bringing a natural instrument and an electronic instrument together into an expressive world called enneaphonie, an artistic mode and a technical means created by the artists of the duo for interpreting electro-acoustical music.