Filters＜限定盤＞

NYのミニマル・ミュージック～サウンドアート・レーベルgreyfadeより、ピアニスト/作曲家Phillip Golubのソロ・デビューアルバムがリリース。繊細で表現力豊かなGolubのピアニズムを通して、無限の反復という概念にアプローチした、美しく瞑想的で構成力に富んだソロ・ピアノのためのループ楽曲集。

Whence minimalism? In the music of its most famous practitioners, it has broadened to include aspects of a more general Romantic language. However, there is also room for elaborations of the original impulse, and it is one of those the composer-pianist Phillip Golub explores in Filters. Repetition is central to minimalism, but in an age where that is most often accomplished by mechanical means, what is the effect when it is still done physically? In Golubs own words, "When we know the repetition is not mechanical, theres a certain feeling of needing to stay very focused with the performer, to be there with them." Filters, among whose ancestors might be Saties Vexations, has gone through several stages. It has been played by multiple instruments, and it is an ongoing project, with Golub adding new loops periodically; heard here are the first, third, fourth, and fifth loops. The effect seems unique to the piano. Golub again: "Each loop on Filters contains two streams of music. The outer stream consists of a single high note and a single low note on the piano, always struck together. The inner stream is a succession of simple major or minor triads -- with an occasional suspended fourth or added seventh -- that continually re-contextualize the color of the pitches of the outer stream. Something mysterious and magical happens here that is unique to the resonance, decay, and overtones on pianos. I think that this blending of the louder outer stream with the quieter and denser inner music is at the core of the effect." The looped materials are joined into larger structures; some simple, some more complex, and the loops are slightly varied. This is a work that, like the works of the first minimalists, demands a spirit of immersion from the listener, and as with those works, such immersion will be rewarded. What would be the next stage? Have a DJ remix this? ~ James Manheim