Rear view
Phil Kay
Getting all minimalist on us
here was an optional trickiness unrivalled upon
arriving slightly late to the minimalist music
performance. bumping into a Swiss man. whose natne escapes me. tip-toeing through the semi-llustered usherings to the back row whereupon the minimalist of minimalist bits of music ever is starting or is about to start; literally the conductor has his hands moving up slowly with huge possibility in his shoulders as we lower ourselves down at the same speed into our seats.
The music was so minimal it didn‘t exist yet. At this silence‘s centre is the true moment of minimalism. the void of silent echo. pre-sound. It was just I couldn‘t fully appreciate it. There is the sound of muscles straining and crumpling of strange paper as us live take seat position and shed coat while all looking directly at the glowing coven of people and insn uments below on the stage.
The conductor is young and the l‘act that his face is all for them and not us is an accepted part. we are here to witness them. He linishes the circle well and they are a tight bunch all in black and each with their own music stand with a wide-rimmed lamp attached spreading a molten light down over the music sheets. rel'lecting enough light to allow you to study the musicians. There is a reason they wear black and it works.
His name is not llenrik: I know that it isjust that this word ‘Henrik‘ keeps jumping up and banging on the window going: look at me. Hello. let me in. (‘hoose me. I'll do the job for which I am not lit.” lleinrich is all 1 can think about so I try to imagine my friend speaking to
together sounding like the sound of mind unraveling. it came back to me. In a way I knew it would because I remembered his name had a memorable gool‘y aspect and I remembered he sent me a card ol‘ him in the Shetlands aiming a rifle on a hill side. It is starting with the single most ultimate violin string perl‘orming an extraction ol‘ the most sound possible from the slowest bowing.
The strange paper sound is someone who came in late with their mobile phone wrapped up like Turkish Delight in semi—acoustic crepe tissue. l-‘inally it is over just as the very quiet beginning is over too and the music builds. Being minimalist. it builds to dis—build and retreats as it emerges and resembles the feel of emotional states
through sound. Some of it sounds like when the orchestra is tuning
up and there is that disregard for
' I In the musicalin ol'the noisings.
There is that enticing gap
' between movements wh ‘n w i g 't mobile phone “ ‘ ~‘
the silence where all connoisseurs
up know no clapping is done and it mrkish is a rare space in the world where
it is trasted your appreciation is
In there and need not be shown.
lltc‘ last piece 1s a loop ol a
tramp singing filesus’ blood never
crepe tissue tailed me ta . . .~ tam
arrangement ol horns and strings and harp supplementing and constructing from the small tunel‘ul phrasing that emanates from his wavering throat into a large gentle orchestration filling the auditorium and totally your consciousness
‘EESKE
him so that in my mind she will say his name. which linishes and the musicians let the sound lade for It doesn‘t work at once. though later on. when all the live seconds into ether. letting an ama/ing silence grow as violins and the cello and the bass are all going off is.» their arms come down slowly.
John Fardell
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