"Founded by James Poke and John Godfrey in 1989 to play at the new Dutch music festival in York, Icebreaker is a 14-piece group consisting of panpipes, saxes, electric violin and cello, guitars, percussion and keyboards. Icebreaker have established themselves as one of the UK's leading contemporary music interpreters.
As a group of musicians that always plays amplified, it boasts an exciting repertoire which encompasses some of the best known and most influential names in contemporary music today such as Gavin Bryars, Louis Andriessen, Diderik Wagenaar, David Lang, Michael Gordon, Yannis Kyriakides. Icebreaker is not easy to categorize or pigeonhole in any musical sense. They create a music that appeals to contemporary classical, rock and alternative music audiences alike. Given their unusual instrumental combination, Icebreaker represent a unique voice in British music making."
"Trance started after a dream I had in July 1994 while I was in residence at the Djerassi Foundation just south of San Francisco. In the dream I brought my music to an older composer for his comments. The composer was a combination of Gyorgy Ligeti, Louis Andriessen and my own teacher Martin Bresnick. This older composer looked through my scores, one by one, and I could hear in my head the music that he heard in his head as he looked on the scores. It all sounded like Mozart. After each score he shook his head in a discouraging way. Finally he turned to me and said 'You need to work with larger forces'.
I woke up startled, and the next morning I started work on Trance. I knew right away that this piece was for Icebreaker. I had been working with them for several years and they were everything that every other ensemble was not. The first time I met them they took me to a cottage outside of London where they rehearsed all day long for four days straight. At the end of each day, they would quite rehearsing, and after a group dinner, they would start playing tapes for each other and talk about music. This went on until 4am.
The rehearsal process allowed experimentation with rhythmic figures that were beyond the scope of rhythm as known in Western music. These rhythms were complicated, yet could not be understood in any other way than as a groove or feel.
The openness of flexibility of Icebreaker allowed me to imagine music with a strong rhythmic pulse, written down, with no one playing the beat, and no one playing on the beat. The players of Icebreaker have trained themselves to play in independent interlocking units going on simultaneously - like all the different thoughts in one's head that go on - like being able to hear all the music that going on everywhere in the world, in ones head, at the same time..."
I know I mentioned it on another thread, but I have to say that listening to this while walking to work in the dark on deserted, snow-covered streets is a thing that is fitting and worth doing. I'd like someone to fund a quick weekend trip to an isolated arctic location so that I can listen to this there for a few hours.
"Pelle Gudmundsen-Holmgreen (b. 1932) is one of the leading Scandinavian composers, an outstanding and insistent voice from the generation born in the inter-war years. This CD is the culmination of the composer's unique collaboration with the world-famous American Kronos Quartet, which has been commissioning specially tailored works from the Danish composer for over 20 years."
Comments
Personnel
Left channel
Ornette Coleman alto saxophone
Don Cherry pocket trumpet
Scott LaFaro bass
Billy Higgins drums
Right channel
Eric Dolphy bass clarinet
Freddie Hubbard trumpet
Charlie Haden bass
Ed Blackwell drums
From here.
Just purchased from the Corner Record Shop.
She owns my heart and soul.
Craig
And speaking of wonderful voices...
More blissful vocals.
I know I mentioned it on another thread, but I have to say that listening to this while walking to work in the dark on deserted, snow-covered streets is a thing that is fitting and worth doing. I'd like someone to fund a quick weekend trip to an isolated arctic location so that I can listen to this there for a few hours.
You really do need to be a Boss 'completist' like me to buy this CD!!
Charlie Alex March - "When the Clouds Clear"
-Electronic, sometimes ambient, sort of post-rockish at times. Listen here...
http://lorecordings.greedbag.com/charlie-alex-march/
Weird, that site used to give full listens to the entire album, but now it looks like minute samples.
Cooling down to:
This is now billed as an "Amazon exclusive," although I see the discs are available separately on iTunes.
"Pelle Gudmundsen-Holmgreen (b. 1932) is one of the leading Scandinavian composers, an outstanding and insistent voice from the generation born in the inter-war years. This CD is the culmination of the composer's unique collaboration with the world-famous American Kronos Quartet, which has been commissioning specially tailored works from the Danish composer for over 20 years."
/from the Last Days of AmieStreet folder
info at the web site
Dylan like I've never heard him before.
Germanprof,
Just added the Varde album to my future downloads list - very nice.
Thanks!
One of my favorite Amie Street finds of '10. Reminds me of James Hardway.
This is a must own album. Fantastic.