Steuart Pincombe - the cello in my life (2020) [Hi-Res]

Tracklist

01. Suite V in C minor BWV 1011 I. Prelude
02. Suite V in C minor BWV 1011 II. Allemande
03. Suite V in C minor BWV 1011 III. Courante
04. Suite V in C minor BWV 1011 IV. Sarabande
05. Suite V in C minor BWV 1011 V. Gavotte I & II
06. Suite V in C minor BWV 1011 VI. Gigue
07. Sonata VI in F major I. Adagio
08. Sonata VI in F major II. Allegro
09. Sonata VI in F major III. Andante-Vivace
10. Sonata VI in F major IV. Giga
11. Projection 1
12. Intersection 4
13. Pression
14. Kottos

My love of sound is inextricably linked to the physical creation or mechanisms of sound. To put it another way, I love the correlation between sound and gesture. It doesn’t matter if those sounds are created directly or indirectly, by the intentional (direct) gesture of a person or the secondary (indirect) gesture of a tree branch scraping against an old rusty road sign on a windy day. Whether direct or indirect, sounds produced through gesture mean something. They can mean good things and bad things, ugly and beautiful, simple and complex, the list goes on nearly ad infinitum. What they all have in common is that they come from something beyond themselves. And it is that which is beyond them that gives them their meaning, even if they may also be appreciated simply ‘as they are’.

This understanding of sound is central to the music I have chosen for this album. Through the recording we move from the tonally sophisticated, developed, and embellished forms of gesture in Bach and Galli into the more simple and impersonal gestures explored in Feldman. These are followed by the pure mechanisms of gesture - both delicate and harsh - in Lachenmann, and finally by the brutal, over-embellished, super-gestural, hyper-harmonic colors in Xenakis. Although these pieces are a worthwhile journey without explanation, I feel inclined to make the listener aware of two cross-relationships: Bach in relation to Xenakis: they are both highly specific in ‘ornamentation’ and gesture and both tell extremely dramatic stories. Galli in relation to Lachenmann: both have simplified forms and much ‘thinner’ specifications than the Bach and Xenakis and thus leave much room for adventurous realization and interpretation.

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