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...Stimmen... Klänge

In Review

...Stimmen... Klänge
Hans Tutschku, Dirk Reith, Hans Ulrich Humpert, Wilfried Jentzsch, Ludger Brümmer, Frank Schweizer

cat number: degem cd1
Prod: 1995
distribution/prod: DegeM
Trechtlinger str. 8 D-10779, Berlin, Allemagne

11 ii 1998

While trying to describe this album to a friend over the phone...: "If you like longer pop songs that start out with voices sounding like angels and then takes you to where it feels like the interior of a large industrial machine, then you'll love this record!"

The intentions are obviously not the same, but the works share qualities that have been incorporated in today's pop/indie music scene. Folk electronic music striving for the millenium? Lots of detail and craft is shown through out the CD. Most pieces show a concern with spatialisation in the performance hall and these are attemps to reproduce this within the limitation of a stereo mix from a multitrack version. The accompanying notes are in German, therefore, my understanding of the composers notes was limited. The spatialisation and complex sections in these pieces provide a world of sound.

Die zerschlagene Stimme

Hans Tutschku's Die zerschlagene Stimme has an abstract feel to it. The source material is voice and drums with processing in the form of amplitude transposition of one source onto the other.

Dirk Reith's nahe zu fern  uses FM synthesis as a sound source, it has nice "pluck string instruments" algorithm, some slow meditative sections, with percussive breaks. Here again the space (electronic or acoustic) is used as an instrument.

Die Chöre der Andromache

Die Chöre der Andromache, by Hans Ulrich Humpert, combines nature and computer music and is intertwined with solo voice and choirs to build the sound texture of this radioplay based on texts from Euripide and Jean-Paul Sartre.

Wilfried Jenztsch composed Paysages illusoires  using the softsynth software. It develops as a rich texture slowly evolving with soft attacks: sparse percussive elements stand out in their spatial location. This is a work that must attain dramatic proportions in a live situation.

The Gates of H.

The Gates of H., by Ludger Brümmer, starts with a rapid trickle from which emerges the sound of a Bulgarian folk choir which precedes a slowed down ending that keeps coming back. This is a very dramatic moment where the rising tension gets an abrupt interjection of short high pitch electronic sound and then lets you fall back into the slow part that resolves the piece.

Frank Schweizer's Feuerwasser  stands out, with less processing in relation to acoutic source material. Water sounds, boat oars rising in the mix (with added phase efect). A slow rhythm emerges, with repeated notes that turns out to be some Swing Big Band sample/loop juxtaposed with crackling fire.

This CD compilation spans the years 1987 to 1994 and I found it to be a good reference, reflecting the state of a certain genre of electroacoustic/ computer music during that period.

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