Presence is a beautiful track from Norwegian trumpeter Nils Petter Molvaer’s 2002 recording NP3. While the video clip was superbly crafted, I can’t dissociate the track from the album’s cover featuring life-size figures on a beach staring at the horizon. The cover is a photograph of an existing installation called “Another Place” by British sculptor […]
Dave Brubeck: Piano Blues
Dave Brubeck (1920-2012) will of course be remembered as a brilliant musical explorer, a virtuoso improviser, a prolific composer with a fondness for odd time signatures and a great ambassador for jazz music in general. Yet, Dave Brubeck still regarded himself simply as “a composer who plays the piano”. The pianist is also often quoted as saying: One of […]
Sufjan Stevens: Coventry Carol
On the back of 42 songs over the five volumes of Songs for Christmas (2006), Indie Folk singer Sufjan Stevens released last month Silver and Gold: Songs for Christmas – Vol. 6-10, adding 58 more songs to the collection. Like the previous opus, Silver and Gold is a miscellany of old carols, hymns and new songs. The […]
Jon Hopkins: Monsters theme
Monsters is a 2010 British independent science fiction film written and directed by Gareth Edwards with a wonderful soundtrack by Jon Hopkins. Monsters chronicles the journey of an American journalist and her fellow citizen from alien-infected and quarantined Mexico to the American border. Filmed on a shoestring budget with only two professional actors, Monsters was entirely […]
Misha Alperin: Her first dance
Two simple chords, a few notes on the piano and a soaring theme on the flugelhorn. Neither classical nor jazz but floating somewhere in between, a slow piece replete with subtle internal rhythms, “Her first dance” is a superb composition by Ukrainian pianist Misha Alperin. Instantly captivating and quintessentially spellbinding. Misha Alperin’s Her First Dance was […]
The Gloaming: Live in Dublin
The Gloaming is a new Irish “supergroup” composed of Sean Nós singer Iarla Ó Lionaird, pianist Thomas Bartlett, hardanger fiddler Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh, fiddler Martin Hayes and guitarist Dennis Cahill. A 21mn live track recorded in August 2011 at the National Concert Hall is available to listen to & download on Bandcamp and an album is due in the […]
