Search - Mark Andre, Shizuyo Oka, Ensemble Recherche :: Mark Andre: durch; ...zu...; ...in; ...als...II [Hybrid SACD]

Raum und Zeit

scarecrow | Chicago, Illinois United States | 02/07/2010

(5 out of 5 stars)

"all sorts, Das Ding, fragments, shards of spiritual experiences are parts, moments of this music, Andre's music comes from deep places, much like Schubert; there is no gloss,ellipsis over a phrase or passage, of timbre, timbre is held as the last vestige, the flotsam of humanity where we can be found, almost like Tarkovski, where fragments, "traces" of something incomplete is presented in the earth, or in water, the image of erosion;



the string trio "..zu.."seems like ugly music threadbare; the title comes from the Book of Revelation the words "von Ewigkeit zu Ewigket"(for ever and ever) are the canonical verse recited daily by the populace, We search for meanings; in search of existence; Andre summons entire extended timbres,scrapes and plucks, snaps against the fingerboards, Am Steg, continuously, it is all shaped however, and structured in fine interweavings of moments, he learned well from his mentor Helmut Lachenmann;

to comprehend Andre's music you need to look beyond these signposts: these signifiers of where his creativity has been;



Great care is made of each string's timbral potentials,as one existence is one single string, G-D-A-E; and Andre often writes for one string's penumbrality, its darkness are eleviated in the thin-ness of moment;we find this in his own notational graphics; included in the nice booklet;



Then the unlikely trio of Bass Saxophon, Piano and Percussion in "durch",here fragments from the Gospel of Luke is a catalyst for creativity; one of the longest pieces herein;again, the meaning comes from the moment lived, existentiale almost, the cumbersome monolith saxophon many times is reduced to noise,of klicking keys "musique concrete"-like moments; in solidarity with the other arrays of discreet,fragments of timbre coming from the "lights" of the piano and percussion,the insides of the piano are often muted, single tones,or plucked as a harp; you sense the human voice wants to enter the discourse, but is not allowed;



You do sense at times the piano having the role of accompanimento,pure and simple;afterbeat sixteenths; this gives a gradation to function,it is an obvious way to structure time, Zeit within this context, and I think it woirks against Andre's aesthetic; the signifiers becomes something else, and resort to the traditions whence they emanated from; nothing is as indulgent in the other instruments;



Andre comes to negate his materials as well,beginning in the center at times; interrupting the music in progress; the music materials, " Musik Fabrik-Gebaude" are not always given love and kindness, for we seldom find this in humanity itself; it is the enigma of his creativity for the listener to discover this in his music;



then the lone solitude of the Bass Clarinet; ". . .in. . .",a Solo Work; again humanity in spirit is always alone, as Christ in the desert, you don't know however if he was praying for himself or humanity, for at that point Christ had a mortal soul; So we need to locate the voice, where it resides,here the Bass Clarinet Solo is a formidable voice, with incredible extended timbres, it serves the modernist cause well;



Then the largest work here with live Electronic timbre fends off the problamatics well, many need to work in this genre exclusively to fine tune it; here again, the timbres from each place, the Bass Clarinet again,Cello and Piano all contribute to the totality in fragments, no one is allowed free space;



and you sense always in Andre's music that it is imprisoned,there never is an expansion of space,a reduction, Redaktion-Geist; as you find in the late music of Luigi Nono,a close voice in proximity to Andre's pallette; and like a voice trying to find itself within itself; modernity it seems right now needs the Spirit to give shape to it, it has long been,inhabited the void, where the "science" of composition shaped the agenda of what it was and where it could go, Andre points to a more relevant cause for now, the unknowns of the present;



brilliant playing from all cadres here;"