Search - Tom Johnson :: The Chord Catalogue

Hard core minimal

Dionisis Boukouvalas | Zakynthos, Greece | 01/31/2006

(2 out of 5 stars)

""I like to think of "The Chord Catalogue" as a sort of natural phenomenon-something which has always been present in the ordinary musical scale, and which I simply observed, rather than invented. It is not so much a composition as simply a list".

With this statement of Johnson of 1985 start, indeed most appropriately, the liner notes of the CD. This one CD work presents "all the 8178 chords possible in one octave" (no microtonal tricks here, just the pure equally tempered piano octave). Each chord is played only once (as we expected in a catalogue).



Having a pure mathematical mind, Johnson arranges his material in a rational way, starting from the 78 two-note chords, progressing with the 286 three-note chords, etc, ascending, until the peak of 6 and 7 note chords (both 1716). After that we start descending again, until we reach the thirteen 12 note chords and the one 13 note chord. These are played as a chord succession (no time to lose resting on individual chords), each sequence on a separate CD track.



The work is pretty minimal, all of the material reduced to the space of an octave, played on a regular rhythm, in a rational arrangement. But there is another important aspect of the minimal character of the piece: Taking the 1716 seven note chords, only one if consonant, the one structured with six successive tones. All others are clusters. The chords with more notes are also clusters. Many of the lesser note chords are clusters as well. So when we come to talk about "all the 8178 chords possible in one octave", there is not really so much variety as we initially suspect.



The rational arrangement of the chords though gives a sense of progress to the piece. The final powerful cluster is a fitting way to end such a tour de force. And most of all, it's a tour de force for Johnson who plays the piece of the CD.



This is minimal at its most hardcore. If you are new to Johnson's music this is not the place to start. I highly recommend his work "Music for 88", which is much more accessible and interesting, being at the same time equally original. There you can even find the piece "Pascal's triangle" which is the little brother of "The chord catalogue", exploring chords consisting only of tones and semitones."