Computer Music From January 2016

Paul Lansky - Ride (2001) {Bridge Records 9103}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 305 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 153 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 12 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 2001 Bridge Records | BRIDGE 9103
Classical / Modern Classical / Electronic / Experimental

Another brilliant disc of computer music from Paul Lansky, who writes: "I look forward to the day when nobody cares whether or not a computer was used in the process of making a piece.If any kind of music is to survive it has to hide its technology, so to my mind, 'Computer Music' should become irrelevant as a category.

This ambitious and beautifully produced two-CD set includes nearly all of Iannis Xenakis' chamber music for strings, piano, and strings and piano combined. Chamber music constituted a small part of the composer's output, since large ensembles and large forms were vehicles more commensurate with the aesthetic of his monumental, granitic music. There are no small pieces here, though; in each of these works, ranging from solos to a quintet for piano and strings, Xenakis was able to express his uncompromising vision no less ferociously than in his orchestral works. While all of the pieces have an elemental character, many with a visceral punch, the actual sound of the music is surprisingly varied, and the individual works have distinctive and individual characters. In spite of the weightiness and rigor of the music, the tone is not necessarily heavy, and some pieces, like Evryali for piano and Dikhthas for violin and piano, have moments of what could almost be described as whimsicality.

First recognized as the dance duo behind the club hits "Stakker" (as Humanoid) and "Papua New Guinea," Future Sound of London later became one of the most acclaimed and respected international experimental ambient groups, incorporating elements of techno, classical, jazz, hip-hop, electro, industrial, and dub into expansive, sample-heavy tracks, often exquisitely produced and usually without easy precursor.
Notoriously enigmatic and often disdainful of the press, the group's Garry Cobain and Brian Dougans worked their future-is-now aesthetic into a variety of different fields, including film and video, 2- and 3-D computer graphics and animation, the Internet, radio broadcast, and, of course, recorded music…

At a time when Schoenberg and Stravinsky were thought of as opposite poles, Roberto Gerhard was combining the density of the one with the dynamism of the other in a wholly personal synthesis. You can hear this in the Piano Concerto's mood swings from the dark and brooding to, in the finale, a Spanish take-off that Chabrier would have thought off the wall. Gerhard's 1960s music is in-your-face modernism that holds you in its grasp, embracing sound with an enthusiasm that remains inspirational today. Listen to the tape part of the Third Symphony–a cut-and-paste job that trounces most of the computer-music generation in its imagination and feeling for what's possible. Epithalamion features material originally intended for, of all things, Lindsay Anderson's film This Sporting Life. Not that its impact is any less than coherent; the percussion writing alone has a fantasy that will keep you entranced. Well prepared performances, superbly recorded. This is still music of the future.

Oleg Nikolayevich Karavaichuk (Russian: Оле́г Никола́евич Каравайчу́к; 28 December 1927 – 13 June 2016) was a Soviet and Russian composer, author of music for many films and theater performances. Some call composer Oleg Karavaychuk a genius, others a spook. For the third one he is unknown, although, by and large, his works are known to all. Karavaychuk composed the music for 200 films.

SoulMusic Records is very proud to present a deluxe 2-CD expanded edition of the 1986 self-titled Elektra Records debut album by soul/gospel singer/songwriter Shirley Murdock, whose work with ‘80s funk group Zapp and Roger Troutman first brought her to international prominence in 1984.

Kerry James Marshall is a contemporary painter whose work explores the complex effects of the Civil Rights movement on the everyday life on African Americans. Through narrative scenes that draw both from history and the artist’s own life, Marshall delves into obscure moments and objects important to contemporary and past black culture. His work is likewise concerned with the tradition of Western painting, and the notion of mastery, authorship, and the erasure of black bodies throughout art history. …