Leslie Ting - What Brings You In (2024)

The music on this moving album from Toronto violinist Leslie Ting emerged from a larger hybrid performance work she mounted, centering around different types of therapy. The sonic elements were modified for this recording—which comes with both a conventional stereo mix and a binaural mix—but the vibrant results thrive whether one considers their conceptual underpinnings or not. Most of the music was developed specifically for the project, although the two brief movements from Linda Catlin Smith’s Dirt Road which open the album date from 2006. Ting blurs any line between composed and improvised material, moving from those Smith duets with percussionist Germaine Liu to the spontaneous title composition—named for the clichéd opening question a therapist might ask—without any sort of aesthetic rupture. Written or improvised, the music all feels of a piece. Ting designed “Sandplay” as sonification of sandplay therapy, with contact mikes installed in the four corners of a sandbox, picking up tactile abstractions fueled by therapeutic motion. Rose Bolton’s “Beholding” features Ting’s slashing lines cutting through a gauzy, drifty fabric of beats, floating vocal lines, and whispered dialogue, all designed to evoke the sort of internal transformation that therapy seeks to achieve. Julia Mermelstein’s “Folds in Crossings” also features solo violin and electronics, focusing initially on the string playing before building up the interaction with layers of electronics that grow more complex, another metaphorical shadowing of therapy.

Tracklist:
1.01 - Leslie Ting - Dirt Road - Movements 4 & 5 (stereo version) (5:56)
1.02 - Leslie Ting - What is the most yourself (you can be with another)? (stereo version) (7:20)
1.03 - Matt Smith, Germaine Liu - Sandplay (stereo version) (8:36)
1.04 - Leslie Ting - Beholding for solo violin & electronics (stereo version) (13:25)
1.05 - Leslie Ting - folds in crossings for solo violin & electronics (stereo version) (11:49)
1.06 - Leslie Ting - Dirt Road - movements 4 & 5 (binaural version) (5:56)
1.07 - Leslie Ting - What is the most yourself you can be (with another)? (binaural version) (7:20)
1.08 - Matt Smith, Germaine Liu - Sandplay (binaural version) (8:36)
1.09 - Leslie Ting - Beholding for solo violin & electronics (binaural version) (13:25)
1.10 - Leslie Ting - folds in crossings for solo violin & electronics (binaural version) (11:49)