G. Regondi, Reverie Notturno op. 19 - Chiara Asquini, Guitar

Review of “what we talk” by Scott Fields and Stephan Rath, Neos 2010

History. It’s 2007, we are in Cologne, Germany, for the Triennial of Music. The program of the Triennial foresees that six experts of Renaissance music would be compared with the same number of musicians devoted to contemporary music. Piano with clavicembalo, organ with keyboards and synthesizers and so on. Obviously the guitar is placed side by side with the lute.
From these joining the musicians must create some new music that keeps in mind of the characteristics of their tools and their musical formation. For the guitar the champion called in the name of the modernity is Mister Scott Fields, American, guitarist and improviser voted to the free improvisation on the style of people like Derek Bailey or Larry Ochs and Elliott Sharp. For the lute it was called Stephan Rath.
The two musician play, have a good time, create a beautiful agreement, they enjoy themselves so much that their music is recorded by the same Fields and after a couple of year printed on cd for the Neos, record label devoted to the contemporary repertoires.
In the notes that come with the cd Fields quietly speaks of music "composed" for the Triennial, but we don’t know if these music have been printed or are available for other interpreters. I sincerely hope for it, because the musics are beautiful, very intense and almost dreamy in their melancholy and the two musicians play very well. Despite the difference about instrument and cultural background they overcome very well the difficulties and they play indeed with a beautiful and pleasant interplay. Both instruments (guitar and theorbo) can do what they want, playing the walking bass parts, the melodic parts, being dissonant.. and they exchange the roles and the competences without grazing the musical texture or without showing signs of yielding. There are 5 passages, 5 track in the cd the first four conceived as parts of a suite and the last "what we talk" gives the name to the cd and stands alone, the durations are among a minimum of almost 6 minutes to almost 23. Otherwise from other situations that see the improviser exceed with a loss of quality here the music flows serene without fatigues for the listener, the two musicians are good and they know how to weave themselves together.
Beautiful record, to listen for the one who plays in a duo or for the one who are thinking about creating together one with a liutist, in this case this cd would be a good base of departure, Scott Fields has his own website and maybe we should ask him if transcripts of these duets exist.

Silvia Colasanti Varia Imaginacion (2003)for flute and guitar

Alessandro Solbiati Chanson d'Aube for flute and guitar

Ivan Fedele Bias: for Alto Flute and Guitar

Mario Guido Scappucci - Escherbach - per chitarra

trio altrove 1.3 plays Sweet-Spots by Thomas Reiner

Review of Venus' Song New Music for Guitar Vol 1 by Gisbert Watty, ArsPublica 2011

The subtitle of this cd almost makes me dream: New Music for Guitar Vol 1! First cd therefore of a series of recordings devoted to the new music for contemporary guitar, enough to make me smile for more than one month.
I know Gisbert Watty well, we had interviewed him a couple of years ago it for the Italian Blog Chitarra e Dintorni Nuove Musiche and he had supriesed me for his devotion and his enthusiasm about looking for new roads and new possibilities for his guitar, particularly for a neglected historicall aspect about the classical repertoire: compositions for ensemble in which the guitar appears.
This first entitled volume Venus' Song, from the homonym passage composed by Fabrizio De Rossi Re is composed in fact from passages where the guitar doesn't play alone, but always or together with the flute of Tristaino, the piano played by Sigmund Watty or the clarinet of Marcello Bonacchelli, or it plays accompanied by the electronics as in the sad passage of Andrea Nicoli or in electric version accompanied by the cd as foresees the music by Thomas Reiner, Australian composer that had already in past composed for Gisbert Watty and for the trio altrove 1.3.
Only one the score for soloist guitar Three Dances in the Abstract composed by René Mense.
Six are the composers for this cd. Besides the quoted Reiners, De Rossi Re and Renè Mense also lend their talent Andrea Nicoli and Thomas Bottger. The music here ring belongs more to the music for herself, abstract music, meditative, proper to accompany the silence, to define and to widen the space.
Only exception the passage "fan-fair" by Thomas Reiner where a to pulsating minimal techno worthy of the more experimental Jeff Mills creates a base for the structures produced by the electric guitar of Watty, correct conclusion of an interesting cd indeed. Now we have to wait the next volumes.
I allow me to signal Venus' Song to all the guitarists that desire to go out of the formula of the solo recital and I make my compliments to the Italian independent record label ArsPublica for this beautiful initiative, not the only to mention in their interesting catalog.

Terry Riley & Stefano Scodanibbio - Diamond Fiddle Language I (1998)

Stefano Scodanibbio: Da una certa nebbia (2002)

T.Riley - S.Scodanibbio: "In D" (excerpt) Ensemble Ludus Gravis

Stefano Scodanibbio: & Roll (2007)

Luciano Berio: Sequenza XIVb, Versione per Contrabbasso di S. Scodanibbio - IV - 2005

Review of My New Adress by Stefano Scodanibbio, Stradivarius, 2006

Stefano Scodanibbio, musician and composer, was one the most interesting player connected to the double bass’s rebirth in the '80’s and '90’s and to the last tendencies of the contemporary music. Unfortunately he died at the age of 55 after a long illness the 10th January 2012. For him have written new music composers like Bussotti, Donatoni, Estrada, Ferneyhough, Frith, Globokar, Sciarrino, Xenakis.. about him Cage has said: "Stafano Scodanibbio is amazing. The haven'ts heard better double bass playing than Scodanibbio's. The wases just amazed. And I think everyone who heard him was amazed. He is really extraordinary. His performance was absolutely magic."

This record, My New Adress, was published by Stradivarius Recording in 2006and it shows us Scodanibbio not as the double bass player but as a composer., all these six passages were written between 1984 and 2003 and are destined to different (guitar, piano, low flute, violin and cello) instruments and not for the double bass.

The passages of My New Adress seem to integrate instead with what the composer has written in the initial pages of the beautiful multilingual booklet of 36 pages that accompanies the cd, this is not an integral job, with an organic idea but instead intuitions, ideas conceived in "portions of time spent, often in distant lands, to freely write music, without constraints or worries, maturities, errands, festival’s tendencies, organic, aesthetics, time impositions".

It strikes the liberty of writing and feelings that shine through the listening, exemplary under this point of view the third passage "Return to Cartagena", written for low flute and interpreted in magistral way by Mario Caroli: his instrument seems to turn into a string, into the skin of drum and allowed to wave for almost ten consecutive minutes creating intense suggestions. Other interesting passages are the ones for guitar. In this record we have in fact the presence of the three notable guitars of Magnus Andersson, Elena Càsoli and Jurgen Ruck, busy in two pieces "Quando le montagne si colorano di rosa" and "Dos abismos". Personally I have particularly appreciated the passage "Quando le montagne si colorano di rosa", that sees the presence of the duo Càsoli - Ruck, characterized by a frantic initial rhythmic line that progressively resolves itself in a more meditative and peaceful mood and that shows well in evidence the interlacements and the perfect agreement among the two guitars.

This is a record that shows continuous quotations and literary and autobiographic interlacements, "idioms, trips, musical intruments", a new side, perhaps more intimate of this great Italian musician and composer.

Ensemble Phoenix Base in concert

Ensemble Phoenix Basel

"De processione mundi" Konzert des Ensemble Phoenix Basel Samstag, 14. Januar 2012, 20.00 Uhr, Postremise Chur Sonntag, 15. / Montag, 16. Januar 2012, 20.00 Uhr, Gare du Nord Basel Programm: José María Sánchez-Verdú (*1968):"Machaut-Architekturen I-V" für sieben Instrumente (2003-2005) Luca Francesconi (*1956):"Respondit", due madrigali di Gesualdo trascritti e ripensati per cinque strumenti con un trattamento elettronico dello spazio (1997) Francesc Prat (*1975):"Rückkehr" für Ensemble (Kompositionsauftrag Ensemble Phoenix Basel, UA) José María Sánchez-Verdú: "De processione mundi" für Oboe und acht Instrumente (Kompositionsauftrag Gare du Nord Basel, UA) Ensemble Phoenix Basel Christoph Bösch: Flöte Pilar Fontalba: Oboe Toshiko Sakakibara: Klarinette Raphael Camenisch: Saxophon Helena Bugallo: Klavier Daniel Buess: Schlagzeug Friedemann Treiber: Violine Wojciech Garbowski: Violine Patrick Jüdt: Viola Beat Schneider: Violoncello Aleksander Gabrys: Kontrabass Thomas Peter: Elektronik Jürg Henneberger: Leitung In diesem spanischen Konzert verbindet das Ensemble Phoenix Basel zwei neue Kompositionsaufträge mit bestehenden Stücken. Der erste Auftrag geht an den in der Schweiz lebenden katalanischen Dirigenten und Komponisten Francesc Prat. Der zweite Auftrag, der von der Gare du Nord finanziert wird, geht an den spanischen Komponisten José Maria Sánchez-V erdú. Ges handelt sich um ein Werk für Solo-Oboe, gespielt von der spanischen Oboistin Pilar Fontalba, die seit Jahren Mitglied des Ensemble Phoenix Basel ist, und acht im Raum verteilte Instrumente. Die Komposition bildet den Auftakt zu einem mehrteiligen Werk, das der Komponist plant. «Arquitecturas» und bisweilen auch "Paisajes" nennt dieser häufig seine Stücke. Aber nicht nur das Konzept von "Architekturen", sondern auch musikalische Vorgefundenes, Musik der Renaissance oder arabisch-andalusische Musik etwa, findet Eingang und Nachwirkung in Sánchez-Verdús Werken. In seinen "Machaut-Architekturen I-V" für sieben Instrumente setzt sich Sánchez-Verdú eingehend mit dem prägenden Tonschöpfer der Ars Nova, Guillaume de Machaut und seiner "Messe de Nostre Dame" (1364) auseinander. Vielleicht hat Sánchez-Verdú beim Titel "Architekturen" gar an die monumentale Kathedrale Notre-Dame von Reims gedacht, in der Machauts Messe entstanden ist. Die komplexe Satztechnik Machauts oder isorhythmische Ansätze hat er jedenfalls studiert und integriert, in einem Stück, dessen fünf Teile von gleicher Dauer, ungefähr fünf Minuten jeweils, sich zu einem Ablauf von raschem Klangwechsel, stets sehr feingliedriger Struktur und insgesamt behutsamem Duktus kombinieren. Der Italiener Luca Francesconi widmet sich in seinem Stück "Respondit" seinerseits der europäischen Musiktradition, diesmal jener einer «seconda prattica», wie sie Carlo Gesualdo in seinen Madrigalen zeigt. Von letzteren transkribiert Francesconi für "Respondit" deren zwei für fünf Instrumente und Elektronik, wobei er sie, wie er im Untertitel anmerkt, nicht nur transkribiert, sondern auch neu denkt: "Due madrigali di Gesualdo trascritti e ripensati per cinque strumenti con un trattamento elettronico dello spazio. I. "Moro lasso al mio duolo" II. "Ecco moriro dunque". Trotzdem bleibt die Musik Gesualdos im Gegensatz zum Verfahren von Sánchez-Verdú stets erhalten; Francesconi verändert sie in ihren zeitlichen Prozessen, unterwirft sie aber auch elektronischen Klang- und Raumbiegungen ("trattamento elettronica dello spazio"), über die ursprüngliche Transformation, nämlich jene einer vokalen zur instrumentalen Musik, hinausgehend. André Fatton Ensemble Phoenix Basel Website Ensemble Phoenix Basel Myspace-Site United Phoenix Records Gare du Nord Website

VVV and G5 LIVE FretLess Fest

FretLess Bass MicroTonal-ImproviZation

NYC Fretless Guitar Festival 2005 Opening

Elena Càsoli: Ingesund Concert- Nicola Campogrande Ink-Jet Prelude n5

Review of FootHills Jam by VEAD, 2010

Fretless guitar is such a curious instrument. It seems such a simple thing seeing it, but when you feel it under your fingers and you start to think about it you understand that it is not an easy thing. Remove the keys is not a simple aesthetical matter, behind those metal barrettes there is a world, a logic, a tradition and a forma mentis that you can’t find anymore suddenly on a smooth keyboard.
The difference is mental, visual and tactile, disappeared the tonal points of reference we are opened to new possibilities and logic that this record well shows. Till now this guitar has been only appanage of improvisators: who other could begin play on it? As always when it’s necessary to map new territories we sent the explorers who start to draw some summary maps and trace new points of reference, behind of their then will come the professional certifiers and cartographers, but at the moment the available musical materials are the solos and the few improvisations often immortalized by the video available on youtube recorded during the Festival of the Guitar Fretless that is annually held in New York.
Till now few are those people who have begun to play it, I quote the tutelar names of Elliott Sharp for USA and of Simone Massaron in Italy.
This records starts an operation of documentation, inside you will find rigorously all improvisations for fretless guitar and bass and for percussions. The guitar plays curious, the ear has to find its way to orient in a microtonale sea, the music is strong, raw and impassioned, this is a curious, pleasant and stimulating cd.
There is not only music but also some extracted by recordings of lectures on fretless guitar that with a lot of humor and so much passion talk of the characteristics of this guitar and invoke loud much more interest from the composers and a news notation’s system created for the characteristics of this instrument.
I recommend it to everybody: opening our mental horizons is always a good thing!