Search - Sylvano Bussotti, Joste :: Piano Works

Spontaneously anarchic combustion of a theatre composer

scarecrow | Chicago, Illinois United States | 12/22/1999

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Bussotti is a Leonardo di Vinci composer, he not only writes music, but texts, designs costumes, scenery,sets, and has an impeccable hand for graphics. At the time the avant-garde valued more the graphic incidents in a score more than how it sounded, Bussotti was quite popular. This is the late Fifties early Sixties. Pour Clavier is one of those works, it's great to just gaze at. After this experience then you need to ponder what kind of music it might wrought. Aside from this Bussotti's music is dense, convoluted, multi-directional, with an affinity for the pure brilliance of any instrument. I doubt if he expects us to hear clearly the complexity he manages to densely pack in a measure of music. You also cannot distinguish one piece from another,except that the early music is more spontaneously ,a bit more violent,more scattered in its emotive non-direction. Still Bussotti is a master at his own concoctions, and I suspect the the real content of his aesthetic is the theatre where he has worked continuously. Like Rossini,or Verdi, Bussotti's instrumental music is fed, and nourished from this drammatic fountain. Martine Joste is simply breathtaking in the amount of discipline she brings to this thorny varigated music."