39 Results for : overtone
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Quiet Time
Q Harper "QUIET TIME" An Artist's Biography Native Detroit performance sensation Q Harper (the eleventh of twelve children) was born Quintin Deon Harper on December 29, 1967 to William and Mary Harper. His love for music was inherited from his father as he began his performance career at the tender age of five. While under the watchful and demanding tutelage of William Harper, Q Harper quickly developed an uncanny, almost enigmatic facility with music, a language he actually prefers to what he calls "all lesser forms of communication". Despite his incredible abilities with the acoustic guitar, piano, and writer's pen, it is his voice, the first of all instruments, which demands and arrests the ear. Boasting a beautifully even and technically flawless tonal quality, this artist's upper and lower vocal registers are rendered with remarkable consistency as he seamlessly moves between each mechanical height and depth- both spontaneously and upon command. Moreover, the timbre of his voice is hued by colors derived from only the deepest feelings, full of sincerity, truth, and a God-given emotional intelligence and sensual intuition. Two unquestionably perfect examples of this type of natural and emotive vocal talent are Luther Vandross and Brian McKnight, artists to which Q Harper's gift can be arguably and justifiably compared. Q Harper, an inspiring balladeer, whose music comes from a time when music was original, raw, and straight from the gut, heart, and soul of an artist. In his music you will find a connection of old school flavor with new school vibes. His hot new single, "Quiet Time", from his debut album, "One", shows how Q Harper possesses the ability to captivate the listener with his lyrics, music, and intimate vocals, leaving them longing for more of his musical style. Further influences upon Q Harper's soulful R&B, inspirational, and funk delivery are the likes of The Isley Brothers, Phyllis Hyman, Donny Hathaway, Marvin Gaye, and Al Jarreau, with a gripping, "troubled blues" overtone reminiscent of the late Ray Charles. At a time when true artists are hard to come by, "one does come by".- Shop: odax
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Kosmogonia
PIANO DIARIES OF A MUSICAL ALCHEMIST Every single composition on this CD represents a time capsule from my life. Each piece I played and recorded on a different piano, in a different city, and in a different period of my life. In all of the pieces I applied the method I call 'preparation in real time'-the personal performance practice I often use in my live performances. It implies using devices, easily movable objects, and different fingerings to temporarily shift the instrument's timbre from that of the piano to that of a harpsichord or clavichord. For instance, in Genesis (2009) and Kosmogonia (Cosmogony) (2005), following the proverb 'necessity is mother of invention,' I came up with a vibrating glove. When placed on the piano strings, the electromagnets stuffed into the glove's fingertips helped create the sostenuto-sounding strings, mockup flute sounds, and bass clarinet I needed. Mappa della Memoria, for acoustic baby grand piano, was recorded live during my recital at the Bogliasco Foundation in Genoa, Italy, where I held a composer's residency in 2004. Based on the eponymous work by the ingenious Italian visual artist Mario Fallini, the Memory Map is a fitting piece to start this album with. Like a traveler who retraces his own footsteps, Fallini draws his version of the iconic medieval allegory of memory, traditionally depicted as a portly matron in elaborate dress, by 'stitching' the titles of his own works in each fold of her sumptuous attire. Sonatina No.1 was composed in 1996 and recorded in 1997 on an upright piano after I rescued it from the local bar and somehow fit it into the kitchen of my studio apartment in Manhattan. I dedicated this piece to Morpho, a large, mysterious South American butterfly with iridescent wings who lives for only a day before being sealed for eternity into a pendant by a jewelry maker. Sonatina No.2 and Sonatina No.3 were composed in 2004 and recorded on an amplified Chinese-made baby grand piano I purchased at a liquidation sale at the San Francisco Opera. In the already-mentioned Genesis, I wondered what it sounded like when God went about making the world. During my college years, while sitting in the symphony orchestra and counting numerous empty bars in my harp parts, I entertained the idea of getting a job in a planetarium. I recalled that fantasy many years later in Kosmogonia, where I explore the ways to depict in sound the mindboggling theory of the ever-expanding universe. This album is dedicated to my dad, Dr. Vladimir Jordano MD. Victoria Jordanova Los Angeles, May 2012 Notes by Dean Suzuki Victoria Jordanova, an American composer born in Kragujevac, Serbia, is probably best known for her magnificent Requiem for Bosnia for broken piano, harp and child's voice. The current CD is her first for piano since the release of the Requiem in 1994. Unlike the Requiem, which exists only as a recording and cannot be performed live (the namesake broken piano no longer exists), Kosmogonia is comprised of works that can be performed in concert. Born in Serbia, a longtime San Francisco resident, and now living in Los Angeles, Jordanova's aesthetic forebears include West Coast American experimentalists and mavericks, Henry Cowell and John Cage. She is inspired by their innovative piano compositions, and especially by Cowell's 'string piano' (when performers bypass the piano's keyboard and play directly on the strings, variously plucking, strumming, rubbing and otherwise manipulating them), as well as his generous use of tone clusters, and Cage's 'prepared piano,' inspired by and extrapolated from Cowell's string piano, in which items such as screws, bolts, bits of rubber and other materials are inserted and wedged between the strings, thus dramatically transforming the instrument's timbre. It should be no surprise that other important influences on Jodanova include Krzysztof Penderecki and György Ligeti, both composers who experimented with and explored sound masses, unorthodox timbres, and unconventional musical textures and techniques. In an undergraduate class taught by composition professor Dr. Jere Hutcheson, Jodanova encountered Penderecki's Kosmogonia (1970) (a work that inspired her own work of the same title found on this CD), Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima (1960) and Ligeti's Atmospheres (1961). The music left her awestruck. Such inspiration is borne out when Jordanova states that she uses a computer and MIDI-instruments to compose, 'But whenever I really want to test an idea, only the piano will do. I open it, knock on it, touch every part of it, play it inside and out, amplify it to hear it's softest whispers, and present it with all kinds of toys and devices to coax every possible sound out of it. And it always gives back more than I expect, surprising me with new sounds and possibilities.' Jordanova's wide-open ears are on a never-ending quest for new sounds, timbres and sonorities. She says, 'Some of the best times of my life were spent with pianos. I have played many pianos in my life and I've never found one I didn't like. From the old upright, which never could be tuned properly, that I rescued from a local bar and worked on in my Manhattan apartment, to the one that fell down two flights of stairs in the French-American International School in San Francisco, which I used to record my Requiem-all gave me something unique. Sometimes I feel that there is more at play than a mere material object, as in the medieval concept of Anima mundi--a pure, ethereal spirit diffused throughout all nature that animates all matter in the same sense in which the soul was thought to animate the human.' She concludes with a rather cunning and insightful proposal: 'Maybe the piano participates in my compositions as much as I do.' In her Sonatina no. 1 for upright antique piano, Jordanova coaxes beautiful sounds from an instrument that would have horrified Chopin and would be considered beneath contempt by contemporary concert pianists (can one imagine Lang Lang performing on an upright piano, much less an antique one?). Instead of regarding the faults of the antique piano as shortcomings, she views them as opportunities for sonic exploration. Indeed, the Sonatina would be a completely different and much less successful work were it played on a pristine concert grand. Those familiar with the string piano and prepared piano, and with works by composers such as Stephen Scott who also use extended techniques on the instrument, including 'bowing' the strings (for example, strands of rosined nylon fishing line are threaded under the strings then drawn back and forth to excite the strings), will recognized the instrument as a piano, but may be bewildered by the manner of sound generation in Genesis and Kosmogonia. These compositions require a vibrating glove, in which small electromagnets are placed in the fingertips. Jordanova does not insert her hand in the glove to stroke or massage the strings. Rather, she uses the glove as a holder for the electromagnets, which are placed directly on the strings. Further manipulation, including use of the keyboard, sustain pedal and touching the string with the fingers, changes the overtone structure for the purpose of discovering new timbres and advancing the music. The amplification employed in several works on this CD is used only to precisely reveal the subtleties and nuances of the piano, rather than to increase power and volume. By running the sound from the microphone directly into the computer input, the normal recording studio problems of trying to accurately capture acoustic sound are circumvented. The amplification and recording techniques allow the listener to hear everything--harmonics, partials and other acoustic phenomena--in a way that would not be possible using traditional recording methods. As a result, one hears the music differently and in a way that enhances Jordanova's compositions and reveals her special gifts. Dean Suzuki Associate Professor of music- Shop: odax
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Harmonx
Harmonx Program Notes: Renaissance Man reflects my interest in the polyphonic music of the 15th and 16th centuries in Europe and effectively demonstrates the contrapuntal possibilities of overtone singing. Notice the apparent independence of the two parts and the use of canonic imitation throughout the work. The second section begins with a strict canon in which the overtone line follows the fundamental line at four beats separation and transposed up a fifth. Midnight is built on a six-note scale. The missing note is the third scale degree, the one that determines whether a scale is major or minor in quality. The title comes from the prescribed time of day for performing Raga Chapghantarava, an Indian raga that employs the same scale. Yokyoku is the Japanese term for vocal music, but the inspiration for this piece comes from music for shakuhachi, the Japanese bamboo flute. A typical Japanese five-note scale is used, and both fundamental and overtone lines are restricted to those five pitches. This limitation creates a stark, austere effect appropriate to a Japanese-influenced aesthetic. The Blues is a two-part realization of the traditional twelve-bar blues progression with a little bit of swing. Tuvan Groovin' was inspired by recordings of contemporary Tuvan throatsingers such as the group Huun-Huur Tu. Several Tuvan vocal techniques are employed, in particular the dotted-rhythm figure, suggestive of horses galloping. Fantasy features harmonic and melodic approaches reminiscent of late 19th-century romantic music, including distantly related chords and keys and the pervasive use of chromaticism. Ballad begins with a simple, folk-like tune, but as the piece progresses, the texture becomes increasingly fragmented and pointillistic while retaining the strict modal harmony. Harmonic Overtures is a work in a more experimental vein. Additional digital effects are employed in the middle of the piece to create complex textures. Variations presents a twist on the traditional set of variations. Instead of developing a given melody, the eight short movements take contrasting approaches to the idea that the overtone line be limited to four pitches (with a couple of exceptions). These four pitches can be produced as overtones on several different fundamental pitches, which provides the needed variety. The title, Goodbye Ravi, is a pun on the name of the Indian raga on which the piece is based, Raga Bhairavi. The keyboard part begins like the tanbura drone in Indian classical music, starting with a single pitch then adding one note at a time until, at the high point of the piece, a chord with all seven notes of the scale is present.- Shop: odax
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Let the Bird Fly
Many of the songs you are about to hear are more than a thousand years old. For centuries, these songs have been carried on from generation to generation, preserved only by the oral tradition. Then, in the early 1990's, a Russian singer and ethnomusicologist Juliana Svetlitchnaia made it her life's mission to eternalize the sounds of her culture's past. Juliana traveled to some of the farthest outposts of Russian civilization, places accessible only by helicopter and lacking basic amenities. Yet it was places like these that gave Juliana the most authentic sampling of the fading tradition she had sought to preserve. She worked day and night, interviewing singers, listening to their songs, singing along with them-and recording it all on a simple tape recorder. Upon her return, Juliana combed through hundreds of hours of the recorded material, transcribing the lyrics and notating the songs. Driven by her passion to share these gems with the world, Juliana founded PAVA: the ensemble of Russian female folk singers. 'Pava' is the Russian word for peacock, a symbol of the beauty, strength, and grace of a Russian woman. In the years that followed PAVA's inception, Juliana has painstakingly selected every singer who has performed in the group. She believes that a PAVA singer must have two indispensible traits: a zeal for the Russian folk singing, and a voice that radiates that unmistakable effervescence of the quintessential Russian female folk singer. This album owes it's existence to Juliana's endless energy as much as to the unique singing ability and boundless enthusiasm of each PAVA member. Although PAVA is an a cappella group, some of the songs in this album are accompanied by musical instruments. These include the traditional Russian balalaika, kalyuka (overtone flute), kugikly (panpipes), and kolyosnaya lira (hurdy-gurdy), the small percussion instruments such as treshchotki (clapper), bubenchiki (jingle bells), and a washboard, and a few less commonly known instruments, such as a scythe. Although a departure from the pure a cappella singing, the use of accompaniment in this album is not surprising: hand-held musical and percussion instruments have often been used in Russian folk music to enhance the liveliness of the songs and to draw out their rhythmic patterns. In concerts, PAVA singers wear authentic Russian folk costumes, some more than 300 years old! The singers admit that this intricate attire has an almost mystical effect on them, as if moving them back into the world that bore the sounds they now hope to reproduce. The costumes are sometimes donned for rehearsals, too, and some singers insisted on wearing their costumes in the recording studio. Whether or not they did, the results speak for themselves: the superbly rendered, first-of-it's-kind collection of melodies, harmonies and lyrics that intrigue and lure us into the amazingly vibrant Russian folk singing culture! Alex Mandel.- Shop: odax
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In Resonance: Overtone Chants and Singing Bowls
No description.- Shop: odax
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Trowo Phurnag Ceremony
The ritual Tibetan instruments as used by the ensemble include the following: dunchen, gyaling, silnyen, bub, damaru, kanling, nga, shang. The ensemble adheres to the rgyud-skad tradition of Tantric overtone chanting.- Shop: odax
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As Easy as Pie
Russian folk songs performed by duo made up of famous Russian folklorist and world music pioneer Sergey Starostin (Moscow Art Trio, Farlanders) accompanied by young ethno-percussionist Mario Kaldararu (Trigon) from Moldova. Album contains authentic traditional songs from different regions of Russia alongside with examples of modern folk poetry. Musicians play on a variety traditional instruments, such as roghok (shepherd's horn), gusli (ancient Russian dulcimer), kalyuka (overtone flute), prosvirelka (reed-pipe) and different ethnic percussions (djembe, udu, barabanka, darbuka). Music on album is a blend of authentic folklore with modern elements of minimal jazz, fusion and avant-garde. This album represents the live record, made in the concert in "DOM" Center. Members of this duo did not rehearse, they just played a little before the concert and took it's course. That is why they called the album "As easy as a pie".- Shop: odax
- Price: 14.59 EUR excl. shipping
