Fabula

Where the typical ECM continental European chamber sound has been associated with Norwegian pianist Christian Wallumrod, Fabula Suite Lugano adds a new, expansive flavor to what might be expected. This rather ambitious program features a core ensemble, but the sounds are bigger or smaller depending on the inspiration or thematic concept. At the center of many tracks is the violin and viola of Gjermund Larsen and cellist Tanja Orning, but the Baroque harp, as played by Giovanna Pessi, adds more bright colors, while the lone horn (trumpet) of Eivind Lonnig completes the cycle of mystery to this spatial, in-the-main haunting music.

“Fabula Mendax” is based on manuscripts written in the 15th Century by Armande de Pange, a companion of Jehanne d’Arc (Joan of Arc). This is The Monochrome Set at its most ornate, and, much like Joan of Arc’s ensemble, features a myriad of fiddlers, pluckers, beaters, tinklers and wailers, surrounding a central core of notorious crackpots. The hauntingly melodic pop harks back to the early TMS period of “Eine Symphonie Des Grauens”, but is now complemented by a (periodically unemployed) vampire’s orchestra, whose cha-cha-charnel chiming careens into carnal rhyming chanting, while saints and demons trip lightly across the slick red fields of liberty. As with all TMS albums, “Fabula Mendax” is at once accessible and arcane, upbeat and dark, lush and spare, and with lyrics that as ever remain tantalisingly opaque.