TERRY RILEY - 'BOOK OF ABBEYOZZUD'

Formats

• NA106 - CD

  022551010628

Details

Works for Guitar, plus accompaniment David Tanenbaum, guitar; with Gyan Riley, guitar; Tracy Silverman, violin; William Winant, percussion The Book of Abbeyozzud (say "ah-BYE-ah-ZOOD", a word invented by Riley, without meaning) is a planned series of 26 pieces for guitar, multiple guitars and guitar in ensemble. So far, thirteen pieces are completed. Riley writes "All of the pieces have Spanish titles and take a different letter of the alphabet to begin their names. They are also indebted to great Spanish music traditions and to those traditions upon which Spanish music owes its heritage." David Tanenbaum had been asking Terry Riley for a guitar piece for some time, and found success finally after Terry's young son, Gyan, began studying classical guitar and brought its world into the Riley home. David Tanenbaum commissioned the first piece, "Ascenci?n," through Albert Augustine Ltd., and through the editing and performance process of that piece the idea for the book was born.

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Press

Guitar? We think of Riley as a keyboard man just as we think of Glass and many another minimalists. Reading the composer's notes, though, the impression is that these pieces are more in fealty to the traditions of Spanish music than the guitar per se. Either way, the music sounds much as you would anticipate: American chamber with Jelly Roll Morton's beloved 'Spanish tinge', the Eastern modes which Riley sets his stars by, and that unique pragmatism which [Glenn] Gould suggested was manifest as music which 'requires instructions rather than instruction'.

--The Wire, October 1999

Audio & Video

TERRY RILEY - 'CHANTING THE LIGHT FORESIGHT'

Formats

• NA064 - CD

  N/A

Details

The Tain Bo Cuailnge (The Cattle Raid of Cooley) is a central part of the eighth-century Ulster cycle of heroic tales and is Ireland's nearest approach to a great epic. It tells the story of a giant cattle-raid, the invasion of Ulster by the armies of Medb and Ailill, queen and king of Connacht, and their allies, seeking to carry off the great Brown Bull of Cuailnge. Following an abandoned collaboration with the playwright Lee Brewer that was centered on the Thomas Kinsella translation of The Tain, I found myself under a spell and so began the work for the Rova. The wonderful rhythms and colours of the ancient names and places; Badb, Bricriu, Conchobor, Cuchulain, Finnabair, Galeoin, Scathach and Daire mac Fiachna must have floated their way to surface in some musical line or other. Although extremely difficult to accomplish, I wanted to have part of the quartet's movements in "resonant intonation" with pure intervals combining in the saxophones radiant timbres. After composing the music I made a tape on the Prophet 5 synthesizer of the tuning so that the players could match the intervals in their rehearsals. Rova has taken this challenge seriously. The result is sounds that I have not heard previously coming from saxophones and is right in the tradition of Rova cutting an alternate groove in contemporary music. When we originally conceived of the project we wanted to leave room for lots of improvisation. This not only takes place in the "Pipes of Medb" and "Medb's Blues" but in addition Rova created the Battle Music section which is one of my favorites and points to their strong compositional abilities. --Terry Riley

Tracks

1. The Tuning Path 17:12
2. The Pipes of Medb/Medb's Blues 7:01
3. Song Announcing Dawn's Combat 8:49
4. The Chord of War 5:36
5. Ferdia's Death Chant 4:11
6. Chanting the Light of Foresight 8:49

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Audio & Video

TERRY RILEY - 'LISBON CONCERT'

Formats

• NA087 - CD

  022551008724

Details

Solo piano recorded live at Festival dos Capuchos, July 16, 1995. This concert represents about 50 years of thought, practice, composition and improvisation for that marvelous and ever challenging instrument -- the piano. I seriously started to consider my voice or role in this arena, which includes the Pantheon of my teachers and heroes, Duane Hampton, Adolf Baller, Wally Rose, Art Tatum, Bud Powell and Bill Evans, in the mid 1960s when I began formulating and composing Keyboard Studies. These works, based on very basic improvisational procedures and heavily informed by many years of study of North Indian raga and jazz, form the basis of nearly all the keyboard and piano playing I have done. Since 1984 I have performed almost exclusively with my voice (not heard on this album) and the magnificent grand piano, which opens doors to one of the most liberating forms imaginable, making available lyrical sounds, orchestral sounds, sounds that are oceanic and percussive, sounds that pulse and flow over its entire majestic range. On this magical night in the magical city of Lisbon a kind of retrospective of my work unfolded and I felt the spirit play through me in a way that gave feelings of rare and deep emotion. Here and there are exhilarating moments in which are framed split second decisions, which opened up entirely new avenues of musical direction and exploration. And finally it must be said that, without an audience, none of this could be brought into existence in the same way. The shared attention to the sound current helps to channel the spontaneity and inspirtation that makes this experience one of life's most sacred and priveleged moments. --Terry Riley

Tracks

1. Arica 11:43
2. Negro Hall 14:40
3. 15/16 5:30
4. Havana Man 6:23
5. Island of Never Anger 8:33
6. Peace Dance 5:47
7. Underworld Arising 2:43
8. The Ecstacy 4:46
9. The Lake 4:16
10. Mongolian Winds 6:49

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Audio & Video

CRISTAL - 'HOMEGOING'

Formats

• HHR03 - CD

  753907162325

Details

J. Anthony, G. Darden and R. Donne (Labradford, Spokane, ex-Aix Em Klemm) journey through simmering electronic, wide-screen vistas to seismic, swelling and undulating soundscapes. From the shifting-sand textures of "Yoke" (replete with deeply moving, melancholic cello sifting through the ether) and "Streaming Wisdom," to the ever-so-slightly somber tones of "Dead Bird," Homegoing is a wondrously thought-provoking, uplifting aural adventure- a technicolor travelogue of things possibly lost, possibly not. File alongside latter-day Biosphere, Deathprod (especially both Helge Sten and Cristal's attention to the minutest sonic detail), and the later, electronically based Zoviet France releases. Pour a glass of your finest tipple, sit back and be transported to a very special dimension. Cristal's Homegoing has it all, and more. "Ultra-deep ambience, a sound both subterranean and subaquatic, metallic shimmering high-end washes over everything like some sort of alien sheen, fields of glistening, cricket-like chitter adds texture to otherwise slow, shifting, smooth expanses of warm soft swirl, dreamy and ethereal." -Aquarius Records "The shards of glassy, strychnine-laced fear are embedded in streams of such delicately processed drones that you would be forgiven for thinking it might have been a dream." -Other Music "Cloak and dagger ambient's the name of the game." -Fact ? Features two unreleased bonus tracks, including a Pan American remix ? Full-color, four-panel digipack ? Edition of 500

Tracks

1. Yoke
2. Streaming Wisdom
3. Mirror
4. Herrevad
5. Homegoing
6. Dead Bird
7. [30 Second Gap]
8. 12:12*
9. Prieure (Pan American Remix)*

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Audio & Video

EX-CULT - 'S/T'

Formats

• 88GONECD - CD

  600385229524

• 88GONE - LP

  600385229517

Details

Hey bro, check it out: In Memphis in early 2011, five people joined forces to start a punk rock band. They each came from different scenes-hardcore, psychedelic, and various flavors of indie pop. Things gelled. I mean, really came together, man! Following the release of two killer singles under the name Sex Cult, they were faced with a lawsuit from a similarly named and very aggressive techno label in New York City. So Sex Cult became Ex-Cult. Playing a series of house parties and gigs in dive bars, Ex-Cult honed their sound-a punk rock sweet spot that incorporates angular post-punk, flying saucer fuzz guitar, snotty vocals and bash-your-head-in energy. A real stone groove! Killer linear punk ? la Wire, Urinals, Australia's X or something, man! A show at SXSW caught the attention of indie wonderkind Ty Segall, and the two began making plans to record in San Francisco. This is the end result-a debut album that takes the living energy of their show and crams it onto the grooves of an LP. Wild, man! Wild!

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